The latest version of the crypto bill Clarity Act is in the spotlight mostly because of its stablecoin rules. In practice, it may land hardest on decentralized finance (DeFi) and tokens linked to it, according to a report by 10x Research.
At the heart of the proposal is a ban on offering returns — or anything resembling it as rewards — on stablecoin balances. It effectively ends the idea of stablecoins as onchain savings products and redefines them as pure payment rails.
“This represents a clear re-centralization of the dividend,” wrote Markus Thielen, founder of 10xResearch. This is because the proposal withdraws dividends to banks, money market funds and regulated wrappers, leaving crypto-native platforms with less room to compete for returns.
That shift could also hit DeFi, despite early hopes that it could benefit.
The logic was that if centralized platforms can’t offer dividends, users would move up the chain, Thielen said.
But this assumes that DeFi escapes the same rules. In practice, the Clarity framework will likely extend to front-end interfaces and token models, particularly where fee generation or governance begins to resemble equity, he said.
It puts a broad section of the sector in focus. Decentralized exchanges such as Uniswap (UNI), and dYdX (DYDX), as well as lending protocols such as Aave and could face tighter constraints on how they operate and distribute value, the report argued. The result could be lower volumes, reduced liquidity and weaker token demand.
On the other hand, the proposed regulation is “structurally bullish” for infrastructure players like Circle ( CRCL ) as it embeds stablecoins deeper into payment rails, Thielen said.
