United States of America: Announced Draft Bill to provide requirements for payment stablecoin issuers and research on a digital dollar

On 14 April 2023, the Subcommittee on Digital Assets, Financial Technology and Inclusion of the House of Representatives published a draft Bill to provide requirements for payment stablecoin issuers and research on a digital dollar. The draft Bill includes requirements for the issuers of payment stablecoins and notes that insured depository institutions issuing stablecoins would be subject to the supervision of the federal banking agency. The non-bank institutions would fall under the supervision of the Federal Reserve. In particular, the Bill would require entities to register to issue stablecoins and be approved, they would have to have enough backing with assets or sufficient technical knowledge. Furthermore, the Bill would introduce a two-year ban on issuing stablecoins without backed assets and would require the Federal Reserve to conduct studies on the issuance of a digital dollar. In case of non-compliance, the entities face up to five years in prison and a fine of up to 1 million USD.