Considering how all-consuming the ongoing battle to approve a new budget is in Congress, it's stunning that cryptocurrency is getting as much attention in the legislature as it is.

This week:

• A market structure bill (CLARITY) moved out of two House committees.
• A stablecoin bill (GENIUS) secured cloture (again) in the Senate, with a vote likely in days, not weeks.
• A hearing was held for the last big nominee for a market regulator.

Zoom in: Tuesday was a very big day, most importantly for CLARITY.

• The House Agriculture Committee voted the bill onto the floor in a relatively short meeting with bipartisan support, passing it 47-6.
• The bill's path out of House Financial Services was more of a slog, with a markup ending around midnight and a much more partisan vote of 32-19.

What they're saying: "Today's bipartisan votes advancing this bill out of our respective committees proves that the timing is ripe to advance common sense legislation that will finally bring certainty to the digital asset space," House Agriculture Committee Chairman GT Thompson (R–Penn.) said in a statement.

CFTC leadership also saw some movement Tuesday. The Senate Agriculture Committee heard from Brian Quintenz, the nominee to lead the commodities derivatives regulator.

• The agency is poised to play a larger role in crypto regulation following passage of a market structure bill.
• Quintenz, as we've discussed recently, will join one other commissioner, Kristin Johnson. However, she has already announced her plans to resign.
• There have been no moves to replace departing members, despite the fact that the normally five-member commission is meant to be bipartisan.

Market impact: Investors are responding positively to all these developments.

• First of all, the Circle Internet IPO last week was received enthusiastically (see below 👇).
• Bitcoin has been teasing a new all-time high, and Ethereum's coin, ether, is finally showing signs of life, with ether rising in value faster than bitcoin for the last month.

Friction point: Critics of these legislative maneuvers remain unsatisfied with measures that have been taken to soften their complaints.

• "The GENIUS Act is riddled with loopholes and contains weak safeguards for consumers, national security, and financial stability," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.) on the floor yesterday, as she urged members of her party to withhold their votes.

The bottom line: Obviously, the federal budget — the "One Big Beautiful" bill — is occupying more of lawmakers' attention at the moment. But this week's movements suggest the wind is at the back of the digital assets industry.

• Legislation would allow the industry to move on from the era of regulatory uncertainty and into one where there will soon be made-to-purpose rules for its entrepreneurs to follow.

As if moves in Congress weren't enough, the market made it clear that there was an appetite for crypto IPOs (or at least stablecoin IPOs).

Why it matters: The result of Circle's IPO last week will convince a number of other crypto companies to go public, meaning there will likely be plenty more cash sloshing around, ready to build out the crypto economy.

Catch up quick: Coinbase went public in April 2021 through a direct listing on the NASDAQ.

• It happened just as the NFT boom was taking off, ahead of a bitcoin all-time high that would peak a little below $70,000 that November.

Between the lines: There are two ways to read this chart.

1. Wow, the market was a lot more excited about Circle than it was for Coinbase.
2. Or, wow, Coinbase nailed pricing its sale.

Zoom out: Either way, Circle now has much more cash on hand to make its play to be the king of stablecoin issuers.

• Maybe less than it could have had, but hindsight is 20/20.

💭 Brady's thought bubble: Circle has a big advantage over other kinds of blockchain-related IPOs.

• Investors probably also want some exposure to the picks and shovels businesses of crypto (look for custodians, prime brokerages and market makers to seek public funding).
• But there's no still category that investors want in on like they want in on stablecoins.
• 👋 Paxos.

In a further sign that blockchain technology will be more deeply integrated with the economy, Stripe, the payments giant, acquired wallet-as-a-service firm Privy for an undisclosed sum.

Why it matters: Stripe processes more than a trillion dollars worth of payments per year and its used by lots and lots of big companies.

• All of its recent moves indicate that it intends to make crypto payments extremely easy for the company to implement, when and if they choose.

Catch up quick: Stripe's last acquisition was Bridge for $1.1 billion.

• Bridge did the hard work of solving the "last mile" problem for crypto payments in countries all around the world.
• Privy is one of those super technical, under-the-hood companies. It makes it easy to connect a wallet to something users are familiar with, like an email address or an app, without exposing personal information in a risky way.

The bottom line: Stripe got into crypto early. Too early in fact, as it backed out in 2018.

• But now it's in again, and it looks a lot, lot less likely that it will back out of stablecoins like it backed out of bitcoin.

🗂️ The SEC has asked Solana ETF filers to update their applications, including addressing staking. (Blockworks)

💼 Bitcoin is in the treasuries of 124 public companies, holding more than 800,000 BTC collectively. (Miner Mag)

🕹️ Yes, but, the market is not that excited about Gamestop joining the bitcoin treasury trend. (CNBC)

🥧 Around 200 companies hold 30% of the total bitcoin supply. (Gemini)

🦹‍♂️ The NYC bitcoin kidnapping story just got racier, weirder and more complicated as the defendants pleaded not guilty. (Decrypt)

💵 Clearing and settlement giant, DTCC, is reportedly exploring a stablecoin. (The Information)