Senate Banking Committee Prepares for CLARITY Act Vote While Circle Raises $222M for Arc Blockchain

The crypto industry faces a pivotal week as the Senate Banking Committee prepares to vote on the CLARITY Act on May 14th, while Circle raises $222 million for its Arc blockchain at a $3 billion valuation. Bitcoin briefly touched $82,000 before settling around $80,600, with institutional inflows continuing their six-week positive streak at $858 million. We cover the major regulatory developments, institutional moves including Ripple's $200 million financing facility, and Solana's historic Alpenglow consensus upgrade now in testing. Plus, physical crypto attacks have already resulted in over $100 million in losses this year, OpenAI launches enterprise consulting services with over $4 billion committed, and we examine whether traditional finance's entry into crypto represents opportunity or threat for existing exchanges.