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Senator Lummis Pressures Banks to Embrace Stablecoins, Not Fight Them
Key Takeaways
- Senator Lummis urged banks to treat stablecoins as a new business line and not a threat to their role in the financial system;
- She argued that stablecoins improve payment speed and cost, with added safeguards proposed through the Federal Reserve;
- She said bank pushback targets the GENIUS Act and noted that lawmakers still cannot advance the bill despite proposed wording changes.
Senator Cynthia Lummis encouraged banks on February 5 to look at stablecoins as a business opportunity.
She pushed back against the banking industry’s resistance, which continues to slow progress on crypto-related legislation.
She spoke with Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business and said she would rather see banks work with this technology than reject it. She explained that stablecoins could become a new product that banks can offer.
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Lummis chairs the Senate Subcommittee on Digital Assets. She described stablecoins as a tool that helps customers by lowering costs and speeding up payments. She said blockchain transactions move faster than current bank systems.
She added that safety measures developed with the Federal Reserve would help protect users.
Lummis said bank opposition is aimed at the GENIUS Act. It is not aimed at the main market-structure bill.
She noted that banks want lawmakers to adjust stablecoin rules to block anything that might appear similar to “interest” or a traditional “bank-type product".
She said lawmakers tried to solve this by calling such features “bonuses” or “rewards", but she admitted that the committee cannot move the bill forward yet.
Lummis rejected the idea that stablecoins harm banks. She said banks could earn new revenue by offering custody services.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told lawmakers that traditional banking and crypto services may become more alike in the years ahead. How? Read the full story.