Yahoo Finance Video and Julie Hyman Wed, January 21, 2026 at 7:30 PM GMT+8

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Benchmark Company managing director and senior research analyst Mark Palmer comments on where the Senate Banking Committee currently stands on the crypto regulation bill, the CLARITY Act, ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.

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Video Transcript 00:00 Speaker A

If the bill is going to get through, does it need to get through in the first half of this year? In other words, does getting closer to the midterms imperil any progress on this?

I don't know how you couldn't reach that conclusion that uh, you know, the closer we get to the mid-terms, you know, the more likely it is that any sort of major legislation, uh, is unlikely to uh, be enacted.

Um, there for those who are uh taking a a different view uh with regard to this bill, they don't necessarily want to see uh, the uh crypto infrastructure built out the way that the bill is proposing. Uh, waiting until uh the Democrats have more power in the house, uh potentially in the Senate, um would uh create more leverage in that regard and uh the ultimate form of the bill, you know, may may look quite different than it would uh if it were to pass at this point.

So, uh the the closer we get to those mid-terms, uh the less likely this is to occur. I think, you know, it's really the next couple of weeks are going to be telling, you know, as we get close to the um potential markups of the bill both in the Senate banking and agriculture committees. That should give us a sense of where we stand at that point.

But behind the scenes right now, there's a tremendous amount of activity uh trying to iron out uh compromises, um with regard to some of these sticking points.

And and just quickly, Mark, which of the stocks that you cover has the most to gain and lose from this bill whether it goes through or not?

Well, in terms of gaining, I would point to uh a couple of stocks in particular. One is Galaxy Digital. Uh, because as I said earlier, uh, the bill really is about creating a green light uh, for institutional investors to get involved in the space. Galaxy Digital has spent the last eight years building uh a state-of-the-art platform uh designed to facilitate uh trading of crypto for institutional investors.

And so, uh, it has uh attracted, um, uh quite a bit of uh business to its derivatives platform, its lending platform, uh, but with a regulatory uh framework in place, um, you know, its volumes should increase dramatically.

Uh, the other company, uh, which I mentioned before is Coinbase Global, which uh again has uh a robust, um, infrastructure platform for institutions. Um, it's not the entire business, a lot of Coinbase's revenue, the majority of it at this point, is generated on the retail side of things, uh, but uh, the future of Coinbase, um, really uh depends a lot on uh institutions continuing to get involved uh, in crypto.

Uh, and so, uh, those two names, uh, I believe are the two that would be most directly impacted uh by the enactment of this bill.

All right, we'll be watching them and the progress or lack thereof of the bill. Mark, thanks a lot. Appreciate it.