Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) CEO Brian Armstrong publicly backed passing the Clarity Act on April 10 after killing the bill in January, as a new compromise allows activity-based stablecoin rewards while banning passive yield.
The January Blowup
In January, Armstrong posted publicly on X the night before the Senate Banking Committee’s scheduled markup, announcing that Coinbase could not support the bill in its current form.
That move single-handedly caused the hearing to be postponed and fractured the crypto industry.
The move drew public disagreement from prominent leaders, including a16z crypto’s Chris Dixon, who posted that now was the time to move the bill forward.
The Compromise That Changed Things
Over the following months, Senators Thom Tillis (R-SC) and Angela Alsobrooks (D-MY) negotiated a compromise. By late March, the two reportedly came to a tentative deal on stablecoin yield.
Then on April 8, the White House Council of Economic Advisers released a report finding that a …