CLARITY Act Stalls, But Regulators Won't Wait
The crypto industry was hopeful the Senate would pass the CLARITY Act before the late-summer recess. Unfortunately, that did not happen. Chances of the bill passing in 2026 haven't fully collapsed though. Majority Leader John Thune moved to advance it before recess. This sets up a procedural vote for September 15, which is the furthest the bill has advanced in the Senate.
The major change in August however was the SEC and CFTC’s posture. In spite of what’s happening in Congress, CFTC Chairman Mike Selig said his agency would use existing authorities to begin building a crypto regulatory regime. On August 23, the SEC then also announced it would be advancing its first major crypto rule.
Our Take
We want the CLARITY Act to pass because formal laws can’t be reversed as easily as agency rules. With that being said, the SEC and CFTC’s proactive action is a welcome development for two main reasons.
The first is that agency rules would still allow builders and institutions to push crypto adoption forward. The second is that agency workarounds would likely deliver most of the crypto industry’s priorities, without the ethics provisions or stablecoin-yield restrictions that Democrats and the banking lobby have been fighting for.
That leaves those groups with two options: cut a deal now and get their provisions into law, or watch the SEC and CFTC write the rules without them. It’s this kind of pressure that may be exactly what’s needed to push a bipartisan deal over the line in 2026.
Robinhood Chain Becomes a Top Five Trading Venue
Robinhood Chain launched on July 1 and initially saw modest traction. By late August, that had changed dramatically. The network has cleared roughly $34.6 billion in cumulative trading volume, and on its busiest days has been among the most active trading venues in all of crypto.
Most of the activity has been in memecoins, but the more interesting asset has been Robinhood's stock tokens. These are tokenised debt securities issued by Robinhood that are backed 1:1 by real shares held in custody. This means a holder gets exposure to the real-world share price while also being able to use it for lending, borrowing, and trading onchain. Robinhood has been covering gas fees since launch, so this activity has come with some of the cost of trading stripped out.
Our Take
Every piece of Robinhood Chain came from somewhere else. Arbitrum supplied the software, Uniswap the trading venue, Chainlink the price data, and Ethereum the settlement security. Robinhood added its customer base, and within a few months the network grew into one of the most active venues in crypto.
Every Robinhood competitor has got to be asking the same question “why not us too?,” and they should be. Robinhood Chain keeps roughly 90% of the fees it generates, and it has become a $100M+ product line that didn't exist eight months ago.
Around-the-clock trading, near-instant settlement, plus the ability to lend and borrow against tokenized stocks onchain are advantages that traditional brokerages can't easily match. We'll be watching closely to see whether Robinhood can keep the momentum going once gas fees are no longer subsidized, as well as monitoring competitors announcing new chains of their own.
Strategy Sells Bitcoin to Defend Its Preferred Stock
Strategy raises money to buy more bitcoin by selling high-yield securities backed by its balance sheet. The biggest is STRC, a preferred stock paying a 12% dividend, designed to hover near $100. Through this structure, holders aren't directly buying Bitcoin. Instead, they're lending money to a company that is and betting on Strategy’s ability to pay the dividend.
The stock's design was tested in June when bitcoin fell below $60,000 for the first time since late 2024. STRC broke from its $100 target, dropping to $71 as the dividend-coverage reserve drew down to roughly six months. To restore the stock to its target value, Strategy rebuilt its cash buffer and bought back $610 million of STRC across July and August. This was funded by selling MSTR stock and bitcoin. The security climbed steadily as a result, reaching $97 by the end of August.
Our Take
The bear case for Bitcoin included a scenario where a major holder like Strategy, cornered by its own preferred stock obligations, is forced to sell a meaningful chunk of its roughly 843,000 BTC into a falling market. This in turn would transform one company's funding problem into a supply shock for the entire asset.
This summer tested the early stage of exactly that spiral. Bitcoin fell, STRC broke from its $100 target, and the reserve built to defend it began running dry. When Strategy sold just 32 bitcoin in May, a rounding error against its holdings, the market read it as capitulation. Strategy didn’t flinch, and by August was selling far more voluntarily and in a controlled way.
That doesn't retire the tail risk of a disorderly STRC unwind, but it does mean the scenario worrying Bitcoin bears most, Strategy as a forced seller, looks far less likely today than it previously did.
