Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) slipped below $80,000 on Wednesday, and U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs saw $635 million in outflows, which is the biggest since January. The broader crypto market is bleeding on hot inflation data that just pushed Fed rate cut expectations into 2027. However, XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) is holding at $1.45, up around 1.2% on the day. This reflects the asset most directly tied to today’s CLARITY Act markup is the one holding up against the broader sell-off.
The Senate Banking Committee meets at 10:30 AM EST to mark up the bill that would codify XRP’s commodity classification into federal law. Senator John Kennedy committed his support on Wednesday, locking in all 13 Republican votes, and Polymarket odds jumped from 62% to 73% on the news. With committee passage now almost effectively done, what’s left to watch are three internal signals that could decide where XRP goes from here.
Signal 1: How Clean the Republican Vote Is and What Got Bundled
For months, Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana was the only Republican holding up the CLARITY Act. He finally changed his stance to yes on Wednesday after cutting a deal with Chairman Tim Scott to bundle two of his own amendments into the package.
The first adds a fiduciary duty provision that requires people in the crypto industry to act in clients’ best interest. The second is Section 904—the Build Now Act, a housing bill Kennedy co-sponsored with Senator Elizabeth Warren. It already cleared the Senate in March. Kennedy met with President Trump on Monday to discuss the housing piece. The deal locks all 13 Republican votes, so committee passage is effectively certain today regardless of how Democrats vote.
However, locking in committee passage isn’t the same as locking in final passage. The bill still needs 60 votes on the full Senate floor to clear the filibuster, which means at least seven Democrats have to cross over. The Build Now Act bundle is a calculated move on that front—Warren’s name on the housing piece gives Democrats bipartisan cover, since voting “no” now means also voting against more housing money for their states.
A unanimous Republican vote today will give the bill stronger momentum heading into June, and that’s what XRP needs to push past the $1.45 and $1.50 resistance.
Signal 2: Whether the Stablecoin Yield Compromise Survives Amendments
The stablecoin yield question is the issue that killed the January markup attempt. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong pulled support hours before the original session, with $1.35 billion in annual stablecoin revenue on the line, and the bill stalled for four months.
Conversely, Senators Thom Tillis and Angela Alsobrooks broke the deadlock on May 1 with a compromise that bans passive yield but allows activity-based rewards tied to actual transactions. Armstrong reversed course publicly the same day with a three-word X post: “Mark it up.”
Then, on May 9, five major banking trade groups led by the American Bankers Association formally rejected the compromise. The ABA alone reportedly contacted Senate offices more than 8,000 times since Friday, urging amendments to gut the deal.
Senator Jack Reed alone filed 18 amendments, including one that rewrites the stablecoin rewards language to mirror traditional bank interest rules. Also, Senator Tina Smith filed amendments to tighten standards on stablecoin products that look like deposit accounts, and more than 130 amendments are queued in total. So here’s the read: if Reed’s stablecoin amendment fails narrowly at 12-11 or 13-10, the bipartisan compromise would hold.
However, if it fails by a wider margin like 14-9—or worse, actually passes—the bipartisan deal would break down. Coinbase could pull support a second time the way it did in January, and XRP could head straight back below $1.40 the same day, with the $1.30 support range back in play.
Signal 3: Whether Any Democrats Cross the Aisle
A committee passage would clear the first gate, but the full Senate needs 60 votes. That means at least seven Democrats have to cross over on the floor, and a strictly party-line 13-11 vote today starts that fight from zero. For comparison, last year’s GENIUS Act stablecoin bill cleared the Senate 68-30 with 18 Democrats crossing over—that’s the bipartisan margin CLARITY Act advocates hope to replicate.
Galaxy Digital’s analysis flagged seven Democrats on the Banking Committee as potential crossover votes: Ruben Gallego of Arizona, Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland (who helped negotiate the stablecoin compromise), Mark Warner of Virginia, Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, Andy Kim of New Jersey, Raphael Warnock of Georgia, and Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware. Gallego is the most likely—he ran on a moderate platform with crypto industry support—but has not committed publicly.
The ethics standoff is what could keep them all voting “no.” The 309-page bill has zero conflict-of-interest provisions to stop government officials from profiting off crypto—and a Bloomberg estimate from January put the Trump family’s crypto-related gains since inauguration at $1.4 billion.
Senator Kirsten Gillibrand drew the line at Consensus Miami last week: “This provision will be part of this bill, or it will not go forward.” Chairman Scott has refused, saying ethics provisions fall outside Banking Committee jurisdiction. Late-night talks Tuesday—Lummis, Tillis, and Moreno with Schiff and Gillibrand—produced “meaningful progress” but no final deal.
As of this morning, the expectation across Capitol Hill is the vote will be partisan. For XRP holders, a 13-11 partisan vote could keep the token’s rally above $1.45 capped—without a single Democrat backing the bill in committee, getting seven of them to cross over on the Senate floor in June becomes a much steeper climb.
How the 3 Signals Combine to Decide XRP’s Price Outlook
The cleanest outcome is when all three signals go in the bill’s favor. We’re talking Republicans staying united, the Reed amendment failing narrowly, and at least two Democrats crossing over.
In that case, XRP could hold above $1.45 and push toward $1.65 to $1.80. And if the move extends past $1.80, the door opens to the $2-plus range, where Standard Chartered’s $4 to $8 billion ETF inflow projection kicks in—roughly 3 to 6 times what XRP ETFs have pulled in since launching in November.
A mixed outcome would be a lot messier. We’d see Republicans holding the line and the compromise surviving, but no Democrat backing the bill. In such a scenario, XRP would likely settle between $1.55 and $1.65, and the year-end target would slide toward Standard Chartered’s $2.80 XRP price forecast.
But the worst-case outcome is the one to watch closely. If a banking-aligned amendment slips through or the final vote blows out to 14-9, XRP could fall back to the $1.30 to $1.40 range.
What to Watch After Today’s CLARITY Act Markup
With Kennedy locking in committee passage, today’s markup is no longer a simple yes-or-no event. It’s a graduated read on three things that play out in real time. The first signal is the contested amendment vote on Reed’s stablecoin language—if it fails narrowly, the bipartisan compromise would survive.
Next is the final tally, of which a tight 13-11 party line vote would make the June Senate floor fight much harder, while two or three Democrats crossing over would put the bill on a real bipartisan footing. And finally, XRP’s price reaction to each amendment vote throughout the morning—whether the token holds $1.45, or slips toward $1.40—would show how the market is reading the day.
The committee vote is the easiest gate the CLARITY Act has to clear. The Senate floor in June, House reconciliation after that, and the White House’s July 4 signing target all still lie ahead. Today’s three signals matter because they decide how easy or hard each of those next steps will be. A clean markup keeps the July 4 signing target alive, while a messy one risks pushing the bill into 2027 or later.
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