The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation approved a notice of proposed rulemaking to implement parts of the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act, establishing a prudential regime for FDIC-supervised permitted payment stablecoin issuers and setting requirements for FDIC-supervised entities that provide payment stablecoin-related custodial and safekeeping services. The proposal also would clarify how deposit insurance applies to deposits held as reserve assets backing payment stablecoins and confirm that tokenized deposits meeting the statutory definition of “deposit” are treated the same as any other deposit under the Federal Deposit Insurance Act. For issuers, the proposed framework would require identifiable 1:1 reserves valued at fair value (with U.S. coins and currency at face value), restrict eligible reserve assets to a narrow set of highly liquid instruments (including certain deposits, Federal Reserve balances, and U.S. Treasuries with 93 days or less remaining maturity), and cap exposure to any one eligible financial institution at 40% of reserves. It would impose public reserve composition reporting each month with an examination by a registered public accounting firm and CEO/CFO certification, set a “timely” redemption expectation of no more than two business days (with notification and potential FDIC-approved extensions when redemption requests exceed 10% of outstanding issuance value within 24 hours), and limit issuer activities while prohibiting, among other things, interest or yield paid solely for holding the stablecoin and certain reuse of reserve assets. Capital would be tailored to the issuer’s risk profile, with a proposed de novo minimum capital floor of USD 5 million and an “operational backstop” equal to 12 months of expenses held in liquid assets, alongside FDIC authority to impose additional, firm-specific requirements; large issuers above USD 50 billion in outstanding issuance value could be subject to audited annual financial statement requirements. For custody and safekeeping, the proposal would require customer asset segregation and controls (including over private keys) with limited exceptions such as omnibus accounts where customer assets remain identifiable. The deposit insurance amendments would specify that deposits held as payment stablecoin reserves are insured as corporate deposits of the permitted payment stablecoin issuer, aggregated with the issuer’s other deposits at the same insured depository institution up to the Standard Maximum Deposit Insurance Amount of USD 250,000, and not insured to stablecoin holders on a pass-through basis. Comments are due 60 days after Federal Register publication; the FDIC notes this is its second GENIUS Act rulemaking, following a December 2025 proposal on application procedures for insured depository institutions seeking approval to issue payment stablecoins through a subsidiary.
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation 2026-04-07
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation proposes GENIUS Act prudential framework for permitted payment stablecoin issuers and clarifies deposit insurance and tokenized deposit treatment
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation has proposed rules to implement elements of the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act, establishing a prudential regime for FDIC-supervised payment stablecoin issuers and related custodial and safekeeping service providers. The framework sets reserve, redemption, capital, reporting and activity restrictions for issuers and requires segregation and controls over customer assets for custodians. The proposal clarifies that deposits held as payment stablecoin reserves are insured as corporate deposits of the issuer up to USD 250,000 and are not insured to stablecoin holders on a pass-through basis.