Autor Cointelegraph By Felix Ng

Crypto industry leaders are looking to US financial regulators to fill the regulatory gap after a major crypto bill establishing a regulatory framework for digital assets stalled in the Senate on Tuesday.The Senate voted 49-50 on a motion to invoke cloture and advance the CLARITY Act, short of the 60 votes needed as Democrats raised concerns over US President Donald Trump’s crypto investments. Industry executives said the result was a disappointment, but pointed to potential rulemaking from the US Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission as the next best potential source of clarity. Source: Brian Armstrong“There is still reason for optimism for crypto in the United States. Now, the SEC, under Chair Atkins, and the CFTC, under Chair Selig, will continue to work hard to issue rules to fill the legislative gap and we will continue to be actively engaged in that rulemaking process,” said Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse on X. At the Solana Policy Institute Summit on Monday, SEC Chair Paul Atkins committed to delivering clearer crypto rules with or without legislative support. However, there’s concern that this solution may only grant temporary reprieve for the industry. “Rejecting the bill leaves firms completely dependent on agency guidance and ongoing administrative discretion,” added NEAR chief legal officer Abhishek Vaidyanathan.“Firms setting their 2027 budgets would face another prolonged delay, forcing them back into case-by-case judgments and repeated legal work while counterparties continue to price in regulatory uncertainty,” he added. Bitget Wallet chief operating officer Alvin Kan told Cointelegraph that failure to advance the bill on Tuesday is “continued uncertainty over how securities, commodities and money-transmission rules apply across different products.”Another attempt for CLARITYThe CLARITY Act could face another cloture vote after Senator Thom Tillis moved to reconsider Tuesday’s failed attempt. Industry executives remain divided over how long the latest setback will stall the bill’s progress.Source: Senator Thom Tillis“Today’s result is a delay, not a verdict. Legislation of this scale rarely moves in a straight line, and a cloture vote can be brought again,” 1inch chief legal officer Orest Gavryliak said in comments shared with Cointelegraph.Related: Crypto stocks slide after CLARITY Act fails to advance in SenateVaidyanathan was less optimistic about any immediate prospects, saying the next Congress was the likely next opportunity to address crypto market structure.“Now that cloture failed, the next Congress is the likely next opportunity to address crypto market structure. The House has already canceled its weeks of September 21 and 28, and the Senate’s state work period begins October 5 ahead of the November 3 election.”Polymarket odds of the CLARITY Act being signed into law in 2026 fell to 5% on Tuesday, the lowest probability since the market was opened in January. Magazine: Crypto’s biggest week ever? Swarm fears prompt AI slowdown: Hodler’s Digest

Crypto exchange CoinEx said it is winding down operations, citing a prolonged crypto market downturn, sinking trading volumes and liquidity, and rising regulatory and compliance costs, according to an announcement on Tuesday.As part of the wind-down, CoinEx will halt new user registrations, referral commissions and other rewards. Futures contracts will enter a “Reduce-Only” mode. CoinEx will also stop accepting new orders or subscriptions across its fiat, margin trading, lending, earn, staking and strategic trading services.“After much reflection, I have come to accept a hard truth. CoinEx did not become one of the industry’s leading exchanges, and the security and compliance risks of running a crypto exchange have become increasingly difficult to contain,” CoinEx CEO Haipo Yang said in a post on X. The closure adds to a wave of crypto exchanges that have ceased operations this year for similar reasons, including BitMart, BitMEX and AscendEX. From Sept. 22, CoinEx will discontinue all non-spot services and onchain deposits, with the exception of CET deposits. From Sept. 29, all spot trading services will be discontinued, and non-USDT assets will be processed. From Dec. 22, the withdrawal period will end, and the platform will cease operations. Any unwithdrawn USDT will be transferred to an independent custodian, which will incur a monthly custody fee. CoinEx will also buy back CET at its initial listing price of 0.005 USDT per token, a slightly higher price than it was on Monday before the announcement. Related: BitMEX to shut down after 11 years in crypto derivativesCoinEx Wallet and CoinEx Vault will remain fully operational, as they operate independently of the exchange. CoinEx was launched in December 2017 by crypto mining pool ViaBTC. The crypto exchange is ranked 33rd with $58 million in 24-hour trading volume, according to CoinMarketCap. “To every user who has trusted and supported us over the past nine years, thank you for your trust and support in the past nine years. Thank you for being part of our journey.”Magazine: HYPE price could suffer as Binance takes its revenue: Alice Liu

Balancer, a decentralized exchange and automated market maker, has proposed winding down the protocol after its post-exploit restructuring failed to generate enough revenue, with its leader saying he underestimated how much a $128 million exploit in November would continue to weigh on adoption. The proposal was authored by Balancer Labs CEO Marcus Hardt and published on the Balancer governance forum on Monday. It calls for an orderly wind-down of the protocol and the distribution of its remaining treasury, currently worth more than $9 million, to BAL tokenholders.The proposal comes after Balancer Labs shut down in March, when executives opted to continue operating the protocol under a leaner structure. Hardt said Monday that while the restructuring succeeded in cutting costs and delivering the products promised to tokenholders, the revenue side of the plan fell short, echoing profitability challenges faced by several other DeFi protocols this year. “What did not come was enough revenue. Most of the protocol’s revenue still comes from v2, and v3 revenue has not grown to replace it. The product worked. It did not sell enough,” Hardt said in a statement on X. Data from DefiLlama show that Balancer’s monthly protocol revenue fell to $371,000 in November from $1.13 million in October after an exploit affecting composable stable pools on its legacy v2 protocol. Revenue continued to trend downward into 2026, with August revenue at just $56,781. “The November 2025 exploit hit legacy v2 pools. v3 is a different architecture, but the event followed the name into every conversation since and made traction harder to build,” Hardt said on the Balancer forum. “I underestimated how much the exploit would continue to limit adoption,” he added in a separate post on X. Balancer wind-down proposalUnder the proposal, Balancer would begin a phased shutdown next month, with new business development ending and liquidity providers given until Oct. 30 to prepare to exit the protocol. Meanwhile, pools that can be paused would move to withdrawal-only, while those that can’t be paused will continue working but have the protocol fee set to zero where contracts allow it. From Nov. 1, Balancer would operate only the minimal infrastructure needed to support withdrawals, and the DAO would be wound down, with a small team to manage the transition. The proposal sets aside up to $400,000 for the wind-down process.Related: Balancer Labs shuts down 4 months after $100M+ exploit, protocol to continueBAL holders would receive the remaining treasury on a pro-rata basis, with the first distribution scheduled for May 2027, when holders would burn their BAL in exchange for their share of the treasury assets. A second distribution would return unspent wind-down funds, unclaimed assets from the first distribution, followed by a “final sweep” six months later. Hardt said delaying a wind-down would eat into the treasury without changing the ultimate outcome.  “Continuing on the current path spends the treasury to arrive at the same place later. That treasury belongs to BAL holders. The question is whether what remains reaches holders while it is still substantial, or is spent first on a path that has already been tried,” he said. The wind-down requires approval from BAL holders, with a snapshot vote scheduled for Sept. 25 to 29. A rejection would leave Balance’s existing operating framework in place. Magazine: Why are AI’s biggest companies suddenly asking to slow down?

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Cointelegraph is committed to providing independent, high-quality journalism across the crypto, blockchain, AI, and fintech industries.All news, reviews, and analyses are produced with full journalistic independence and integrity. For more details on our standards and processes, please read our Editorial Policy.