Republican senators in the US House of Representatives have introduced a bill that could take control of payment stablecoins from the SEC.
Bill Declares Stablecoins Are Not Securities
The new payment stablecoin regulation proposal aims to devolve authority from the SEC to federal and state bank and credit union regulators.
The new draft bill is half the length of the previous draft released last fall and is specifically tailored to focus on the rules governing the registration process for individual potential stablecoin issuers.
It also clarifies and updates US laws to confirm that stablecoins are not securities and, accordingly, should not be regulated by the SEC.
But the bill envisions a larger role in the market for state regulators, even though the vast majority of states do not yet have a stablecoin issuance system.
The final version was drafted by the committee's Republicans and has been described by Republican Party representatives as a "starting point" for discussions with House Democrats, the Senate, and the White House on stablecoin regulation in the coming months.
The stablecoin market is believed to be worth more than $180 billion overall and operates without a specific legal framework.
This led to what lawmakers described as a war of territory between regulators, as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) wanted to regulate stablecoins as commodities and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) wanted to regulate them like securities.
*Not investment advice.