Following a hearing on Tuesday on the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) role and capacity to oversee cryptocurrency businesses, legislators convened again on Wednesday for a hearing titled “Understanding Stablecoins’ Role in Payments and the Need for Legislation.”
The hearing on stablecoins, sponsored by the newly formed House Subcommittee on Digital Assets, highlighted that there is still a substantial vacuum in federal law controlling digital assets, regardless of its use case.
When we originally reported on the 73-page draft law under consideration at Wednesday’s session, there was a chance that Congress may bring stablecoins deeper into the legislative fold by approving the first significant piece of crypto legislation shared by politicians in 2023.
The proposed measure would allow both banks and non-banks to produce stablecoins.
Those aspirations were crushed by what onlookers characterized as bipartisan wrangling among the present MPs.
Gulf Democrat-Republican
“I want to reiterate the urgency for those of us in this room to work together to pass payment stablecoin legislation,” said subcommittee Chairman French Hill, R-Ark., to kick off the session.
“Recent reports indicate that digital asset developers are leaving America to go to countries that have a more established regulatory framework for digital assets,” Hill said, calling the scenario “not good” for innovation, jobs, or consumer and investor protection.
When Democrats controlled the House, the discussion draft of stablecoin regulation, titled “A bill to provide requirements for payment stablecoin issuers, research on a digital dollar, and for other purposes,” was authored by then-Chair Maxine Waters, D-Calif., and ranking member Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., of the House Financial Services Committee.
