Crypto Tax Bill Survives 38–5 Vote While CLARITY Act Crashes the Senate's $10-Ceiling 🏛️

The U.S. House Ways and Means Committee voted 38–5 on Wednesday to advance the Digital Asset Tax Certainty Act, H.R. 10357, sending the 114-page crypto tax package to the full House one day after the Senate failed to move the separate CLARITY Act. Committee Chairman Rep. Jason Smith (R-Mo.) called the markup "a historic moment for this Committee: after more than a year of working together, Republican and Democrat Members have come together to establish the first-ever tax framework for digital assets." Smith added that the legislation brings "clarity, parity, and workability to digital asset taxation and helping keep the United States the crypto capital of the world, instead of pushing that innovation, and the jobs that come with it, offshore," and said he looks forward to "building on that work as we move these policies forward."

The bill, introduced by Smith and scheduled for a 10 a.m. Eastern markup on Sept. 16, creates a de minimis exemption for qualifying network or transaction fees of $10 or less, allowing taxpayers to disregard gains or losses when digital assets are used to pay those fees, with relief set to begin in 2028. It uses the redemption value of qualifying dollar-pegged stablecoins as their tax basis when purchased near that value, classifies income from blockchain validator activities as ordinary income, establishes whether that income is sourced inside or outside of the United States, and lets qualifying investment trusts stake digital assets without losing their trust status. The package extends wash-sale and constructive-sale rules to widely traded digital assets, exempts qualifying crypto loans from being treated as taxable sales, allows simplified accounting for widely traded crypto assets, and creates a voluntary disclosure program administered by the Treasury for eligible taxpayers to correct earlier digital asset tax violations.

The final text dropped the reward-deferral provision contained in Rep. Mike Carey's Tax Clarity for Mining and Staking Act (H.R. 9175), which would have let taxpayers choose between recognizing newly created tokens as income when received or treating them like self-created property taxed when sold; without it, mining and staking rewards remain taxable when received or brought under the recipient's control. The Blockchain Association, Crypto Council for Innovation and Digital Chamber had urged Congress to pass Carey's legislation as introduced, arguing that taxing rewards before they can be sold creates liquidity problems for miners and stakers, and had opposed an amendment that would have limited the deferral to five years. In June, the committee circulated seven crypto tax drafts covering stablecoins, mining, staking and reporting-burden measures ahead of a hearing on digital asset taxation.

The Ways and Means action follows Tuesday's 49–50 Senate vote failing to invoke cloture on the CLARITY Act, falling short of the 60 votes needed to advance the market-structure bill to formal floor debate. Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), chair of the Senate Banking Subcommittee on Digital Assets and a lead sponsor, said after the vote that Democrats "presented demands and the second we met them, they made new demands and moved the goal posts," adding that they had voted against proposed consumer protections and restrictions on politicians' personal crypto investments. SEC Chair Paul Atkins said Wednesday that the agency will "act decisively within the SEC's statutory authority to deliver certainty for American investors and for the entrepreneurs shaping our technological future," writing "Stay tuned," while CFTC Chair Michael Selig said the CFTC is "locked in and ready to ship its rules for the new frontier of finance."

Eight banking trade groups wrote to Senate leaders John Thune and Chuck Schumer on Monday urging tighter restrictions on stablecoin rewards in the CLARITY Act, saying exceptions could permit interest-like payments that pull deposits from banks, and they said they could not support the latest revisions on rewards for transactions involving stablecoins—tokens typically pegged to the dollar. The Digital Asset Tax Certainty Act still requires passage by the House and Senate in identical form and signature by the president before becoming law, leaving roughly five weeks of scheduled congressional work between the November elections and the start of the next session in January for further action.