Draft legislation would require Fed to create stablecoin guidelines

June 9 (MT Newswires) -- The Republican chair of the House Financial Services Committee unveiled a revised draft of the primary legislative proposal for regulating stablecoins.

This draft, released Thursday, incorporates certain positions put forth by Democratic lawmakers. The draft is still preliminary and will be further discussed during a committee hearing chaired by Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., on Tuesday.

According to a committee representative, this concise new draft aims to merge some of the viewpoints from both parties and includes additional input from Republican committee members.

The proposed version requires the Federal Reserve to establish guidelines for issuing stablecoins, but it also allows state regulators to oversee the companies that issue these tokens.

In comparison to the previous Republican bill, the new draft grants the Federal Reserve additional powers. This includes the ability to intervene in emergencies involving state-regulated issuers. Moreover, states could opt to transfer their supervisory responsibilities to the federal regulatory body.

This bill would establish the first U.S. regulations for stablecoins, which are digital tokens tied to stable assets like the U.S. dollar. These tokens are commonly used in cryptocurrency markets to facilitate trading between more volatile coins.

The new draft also eliminates a previous section that called for research on the potential benefits of a digital dollar.

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