Brad Garlinghouse (브래드 갈링하우스), chief executive of Ripple, said the cryptocurrency industry will ultimately survive regardless of whether the U.S. Congress passes the Clarity bill.

On Sept. 15, blockchain outlet U.Today reported that Garlinghouse attended a digital asset event in Kansas City that day. While supporting the Clarity bill, a market-structure measure, he said the industry would not collapse just because the bill fails to clear Congress.

Garlinghouse cited technological competitiveness. "If there is better, faster, stronger technology, usually it wins," he said. He also pointed to the existing financial system failing to keep pace with the speed of technological change. He argued there is no reason for the United States to take the risk of ceding leadership to overseas markets.

The comments came as the Clarity bill faced a key procedural vote in the Senate. On Sept. 15, the Senate held a cloture vote to begin consideration of the bill, but it fell short of the 60 votes needed to bring it forward, with 50 in favor and 49 against.

Republican leaders on Sept. 13 offered an amendment adding ethics rules to limit profits from cryptocurrency businesses by public officials, but it did not win over opposition. Several Democratic senators say such concessions alone are not enough.

Even if the vote fails, the bill is not immediately scrapped. The issue is time. As the U.S. midterm election schedule approaches, the legislative calendar for handling major bills is shrinking quickly. In that situation, the procedural vote on the Clarity bill had been likely to become a watershed for future discussions.

Garlinghouse has recently urged senators to support progress on the bill. He argued that pursuing a perfect bill should not derail a realistic compromise, and he stressed that substantial concessions have already been made during months of negotiations.

Garlinghouse, who has emphasized the need for a market-structure bill, again separated the industry's survival from the bill's fate. While reaffirming that the Clarity bill is important, he drew a line, saying he does not see the fate of the cryptocurrency industry as depending on this single bill. If the bill passes, it would add momentum to building the domestic framework in the United States, but failure to pass alone would not make the industry itself disappear.

Garlinghouse's comments are interpreted as again showing a view that, separate from legislative discussions to bring the industry into the institutional fold, technological competitiveness and market demand will support the industry's durability.