Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) filed cloture on the motion to proceed to H.R. 3633, the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, advancing the bill toward a Senate floor vote. H.R. 3633 passed the House of Representatives in 2025 and was reported by the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on 1 June 2026. Cloture on the motion to proceed is a procedural step under Senate Rule XXII that requires 60 votes to invoke and, if successful, limits debate to 30 hours before a vote on whether to proceed to the bill.
The Digital Asset Market Clarity Act would amend the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and the Commodity Exchange Act (7 U.S.C. §§ 1 et seq.) to create a statutory classification system for digital assets. Assets deemed digital commodities would fall under CFTC jurisdiction; assets representing securities interests in issuers would remain under SEC jurisdiction. The bill introduces a new category of CFTC-licensed digital commodity exchange and sets out capital, custody, and disclosure requirements for registered intermediaries. The SEC and CFTC published joint guidance on 17 March 2026 clarifying the application of existing federal securities and commodity laws to crypto assets pending enactment.
If enacted, the Act would directly affect crypto asset exchanges, custodians, broker-dealers, and protocol developers operating in the United States. Entities currently offering digital commodity trading without a CFTC licence would need to register as digital commodity exchanges or digital commodity brokers. Custodians holding customer digital commodity assets would face segregation and insurance requirements analogous to those applicable to futures commission merchants. DeFi protocol operators would face disclosure obligations when their protocols transact US persons in assets classified as digital commodities.
The cloture vote outcome is not certain. Sixty votes are required to proceed; the Republican caucus holds 53 seats, requiring at least seven Democratic votes to advance the bill. The CFTC has stated it will advance crypto-sector rulemaking under existing Commodity Exchange Act authority regardless of the bill's outcome. No enactment date has been set.
Licentium advises crypto exchanges, custodians, and protocol developers on US and international digital asset regulatory strategy. Work we undertake includes digital commodity exchange registration analysis, CFTC and SEC regulatory mapping for token classification, DeFi compliance programme design, and cross-border digital asset regulatory strategy.
Source: H.R. 3633, Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, 119th Congress (2025-2026), Congress.gov