CLARITY ACT FALLS SHORT IN SENATE AMID TRUMP CRYPTO ETHICS FIGHT
The U.S. Senate failed to advance the CLARITY Act on Tuesday after lawmakers could not reach the 60 votes required to move the cryptocurrency market structure bill forward, with disagreements over ethics rules tied to President Donald Trump’s crypto interests proving difficult to resolve. KEY TAKEAWAYS ETHICS DISPUTE BLOCKS BIPARTISAN AGREEMENT The vote followed more than a year of negotiations over legislation designed to establish a federal regulatory framework for digital assets and clarify the responsibilities of the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Republicans made last minute changes to the bill, including revisions to its ethics provisions. The updated language would restrict public officials from issuing or sponsoring certain crypto assets and allow state attorneys general to bring cases involving alleged violations. It also addressed the handling of significant financial interests by public officials. Democrats argued that the provisions did not go far enough, particularly because of Trump’s financial ties to crypto ventures including World Liberty Financial and the TRUMP memecoin. Sen. Mark Warner said the unresolved conflict of interest prevented him from supporting the bill. “Ultimately, the failure to address this fundamental conflict of interest made it impossible for me to support moving forward.” Sen. Elizabeth Warren similarly argued that Congress needed stronger safeguards against political self-dealing and said the latest version did not adequately address Trump’s crypto interests. Republicans rejected the criticism. Sen. Cynthia Lummis, one of the bill’s principal architects, argued that Democrats continued introducing new demands after Republicans had incorporated requested changes. The two sides therefore entered Tuesday’s vote without the bipartisan agreement needed to clear the procedural threshold. A SETBACK, BUT NOT A FINAL DEFEAT The Senate vote was procedural rather than a final vote on whether the CLARITY Act should become law. The failure therefore does not formally eliminate the legislation. However, the timing creates another obstacle. Congress is approaching the November midterm elections, after which lawmakers could have only a limited window to revive the measure before the current congressional session ends. If the Senate eventually advances the bill, the House would still have to consider it. The political divide also exposed a broader problem for the legislation. Several Democrats who had previously supported major crypto legislation did not vote to advance CLARITY, while Republicans Susan Collins, Josh Hawley, Jerry Moran and Thom Tillis also opposed the motion, according to Reuters. That split suggests the disagreement extends beyond the general question of whether the United States should establish crypto rules. Lawmakers remain divided over the details, including ethics requirements, stablecoin related provisions, law enforcement powers and the allocation of regulatory authority. REGULATORS CONTINUE WITHOUT CONGRESS The legislative setback does not mean U.S. crypto policy has stopped moving. SEC Chair Paul Atkins said before the Senate vote that Congress should advance the CLARITY Act, while also making clear that the SEC would continue its own regulatory work regardless of the legislative outcome. The SEC has already been pursuing its Regulation Crypto Assets initiative, while the CFTC has also been working on rules within its existing authority. On Sept. 17, the SEC announced an Innovation Exemption allowing certain platforms to facilitate trading of tokenized national market system stocks under temporary conditions. The distinction matters because agency rules can be changed by future regulators, while legislation provides a statutory framework that generally offers greater durability. Conclusion The Senate’s failure to advance the CLARITY Act leaves the United States without the comprehensive federal crypto market structure legislation its sponsors had hoped to pass in 2026. The immediate dispute centered on ethics and Trump’s crypto interests, but negotiations also remain unresolved over several technical aspects of the proposed framework. The bill can still be revisited, but another vote would require lawmakers to bridge the remaining disagreements while working within a narrowing congressional calendar. In the meantime, the SEC and CFTC are continuing to develop rules under their existing authority, leaving the U.S. crypto industry with a regulatory framework that remains partly dependent on agency action rather than a single federal statute.
Safest Crypto Wallets 2026: How to Secure Your Digital Assets
The safest crypto wallet is the one that stops the attack most likely to reach you, and for most people that is a hardware device bought direct from its maker, with the recovery phrase written by hand. The brand on the box matters far less than that. Crypto wallets, like any digital tool, can be vulnerable to hacks, scams or user error. The risks are highest with hot wallets, which are always online. The scale is measurable, and worth separating. Chainalysis counted over $3.4 billion in theft from January through early December 2025, most of it from exchanges and other services, and attributed $2.02 billion of 2025’s total to North Korean hackers, a 51 percent rise year on year. Theft from individuals’ own wallets moved the other way, falling from a 2024 peak of $1.5 billion to $713 million in 2025. Key Takeaways Which Type of Crypto Wallet Is the Safest? On security alone, cold wallets are the stronger option, because a device that never touches the internet cannot be reached by remote malware or a phishing page. That narrows the ways in to three: physical access, exposure of the recovery phrase, and approving a bad transaction yourself. The narrowing is real, and it is not immunity. A hardware wallet signs whatever you confirm, so a fake site can spend from cold storage the moment you approve. Hardware Wallets are considered the most secure because they store your private keys offline, making them less vulnerable to hacking. Hot wallets are more exposed and can still be set up well. Device protection, hardware pairing and care over what you sign carry most of the weight. Related read: Cold Storage Solutions for Crypto Assets What “Safest” Actually Means: The Attacks That Take Funds A wallet is safe against a specific list of attacks and defenceless against the ones it was never built to stop, so the question is which list matches you. Your twelve or twenty-four words are the first item on it, and most exposures are mundane: a photo that syncs to the cloud, or a phrase typed into a fake validation page. Attack Who it hits The property that stops it Recovery phrase exposure Every self-custody user Handwritten or metal backup, never photographed or typed Supply chain tampering Hardware buyers Direct purchase and on-device seed generation Clipboard hijacking Anyone pasting an address Full address verified on the device’s own screen Malicious token approvals DeFi and dApp users Readable signing, capped allowances, periodic revocation SIM swap and email takeover Custodial and cloud-backed accounts App or hardware second factor, never SMS Physical coercion Holders known to be holders Privacy about holdings, and a small balance in the wallet you would be made to open Loss of access on death Families of holders A written, tested recovery plan Malicious Token Approvals You sign an approval letting a contract move a token for you. Nothing leaves immediately, so nothing feels wrong, until the contract is drained weeks later. SIM Swap and Physical Coercion An exchange account that resets through an SMS code is protected by a mobile carrier’s call centre. Self-custody is not exempt: if you created the wallet with Google or Apple sign-in, or let it back up to Drive or iCloud, that account is the way in, so put an authenticator app on it. Coercion is the other bypass, and it is now counted. Chainalysis counted 46 violent crypto-related incidents worldwide in the first half of 2026, against 40 at the same point in 2025, with more than $30 million taken. Some hardware wallets add a passphrase that opens a second, hidden wallet, limiting what an attacker can be shown. The recovery phrase alone will not restore it, so a forgotten passphrase loses those funds permanently. Top 3 Safest Cold Wallets of 2026 1. Ledger Crypto Wallet Ledger devices are built around a certified secure element, and the recovery phrase is generated on the device in front of you. That defeats the commonest supply chain attack, a device that arrives already seeded with someone else’s phrase, provided you buy direct. Why it’s safe 2. Ellipal Titan Crypto Wallet ELLIPAL publishes that the Titan 2.0 has “no WiFi, no Bluetooth, no USB data”, that you “sign every transaction by QR code”, and that it runs a CC EAL5+ secure chip. ELLIPAL also lists a self-destruct mechanism and says that if tampering is detected “the device is designed to erase your private keys”, which is a design claim rather than a tested result. Why it’s safe 3. SafePal Crypto Wallet SafePal’s S1 store page publishes “100% air-gapped signing”, no NFC, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or USB connection, an EAL6+ secure element and an anti-tampering self-destruct mechanism, at the lowest price here. Kraken Security Labs reported in February 2021 that it bypassed the tamper detection and downgraded the firmware. SafePal’s response says the researchers “failed to steal the seed” and that firmware V1.0.24 patched the downgrade. Why it’s safe Top 5 Safest Hot Wallets of 2026 1. Coinbase Wallet (Web3) Coinbase Wallet is self-custodial and separate from a Coinbase exchange account. Its security page says “Nobody, including Coinbase, can access your tokens or NFTs without your recovery phrase”. Two-factor authentication is not among its features. The security page lists biometrics, passwords and security locks, Ledger pairing, token approval alerts, transaction previews and a malicious-app blocklist. There is no Coinbase login on the wallet to guard, though it can be created and restored through an email, Apple or Google sign-in, so that account carries the second factor. The product also spent a year as Base App before returning to the Coinbase Wallet name in September 2026. Why it’s safe 2. MetaMask Crypto Wallet MetaMask is self-custodial and the default front door to decentralised finance. Your protection is the vault password, the device, and the Secret Recovery Phrase, which MetaMask says it cannot access. You will often see two-factor authentication listed as a MetaMask feature. The two-factor article in its help centre covers the MetaMask Developer account and