Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has said that payment stablecoins in the US are a form of money and that the central bank should play a robust role in their regulation.
Powell’s comments, at the House of Representatives Financial Services Committee’s semi-annual hearing, came in response to U.S. representative Maxine Waters on a proposed stablecoin bill from the Republicans, which would create 58 different licenses with federal regulatory approval over only two of them.
Powell responded:
“We do see payment stablecoins as a form of money, […] and we believe that it would be appropriate to have quite a robust federal role in what happens in stablecoin going forward.”
Powell’s position differs from that of Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chair Gary Gensler, who has said that stablecoins may require registration and regulation and that all cryptocurrencies except Bitcoin are securities. It also runs contrary to Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CTFC) Chair Rostin Behnam, who sees stablecoins as commodities.
Payment Stablecoins in the US Are a Form of Money