Coinbase uses its might in DC

A major cryptocurrency bill was headed for a committee vote in the Senate on Thursday after months of negotiations, a crucial step in the legislative process.

- DAVID YAFFE-BELLANY

Then came a social media post from the top executive of Coinbase, the largest US crypto company.

“Coinbase unfortunately can’t support the bill as written,’ Brian Armstrong, the CEO of Coinbase, posted on Xon Wednesday evening. “This version would be materially worse than the current status quo. We'd rather have no bill than a bad bill.”

Within hours, the Senate vote was cancelled.

The fate of a hotly contested legislative vote typically hinges on a few key lawmakers who are the moderate voices ina partisan scuffle. But what happened this week to the landmark crypto bill shows how much power Coinbase now wields in Washington, DC, with the crypto industry newly ascendant under President Donald Trump.

For months, congressional staff had worked on the Clarity Act, a nearly 300-page bill designed to establish a regulatory framework for virtually every aspect of crypto, with rules the industry helped write. But at the last minute, Mr Armstrong objected to proposed language that threatened to outlaw one of Coinbase’s products and said the bill would assign too much authority to the Securities and Exchange Commission, the nation’s top financial regulator.

Coinbase’s decisive intervention follows years of the company’s work to build voice in Washington. A publicly traded firm worth nearly $70 billion, Coinbase helped finance a network of political action committees that spent more than $130 million to influence congressional races in 2024, aiming to elect pro-crypto legislators.