No federal agency issued a final rule by July 18, 2026, leaving stablecoin issuers to prepare under draft regulations that could still change. The law still takes effect Jan. 18, 2027.
Federal regulators missed the one-year deadline to finalize rules under the GENIUS Act, the stablecoin law President Trump signed in July 2025. No federal agency issued a final rule by July 18, 2026, the statutory deadline.
The law still takes effect Jan. 18, 2027, or 120 days after the publication of final rules, whichever comes first, Coin Bureau said in a post. That leaves stablecoin issuers preparing under draft regulations that could still change.
Five agencies share responsibility for the rulemaking: the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Federal Reserve Board, the National Credit Union Administration and the Treasury Department. Over the past 12 months, regulators published ten separate notices of proposed rulemaking. Treasury led with four proposals covering general implementation, registration for international issuers and anti-money laundering compliance. The OCC drafted standards for payment stablecoin issuers seeking national charters. The FDIC wrote prudential requirements covering reserve management and capital adequacy, along with redemption procedures. The NCUA developed licensing frameworks for federally insured credit unions.
A customer identification program rule was jointly proposed by five agencies. Public comment on that proposal continues through Aug. 21. The FDIC’s anti-money laundering proposal accepts public input until Aug. 4. Those timelines guarantee that certain regulations won’t be finalized until well past the statutory deadline.
Regulators must process a large volume of public comments before completing rules. BlackRock submitted feedback urging the OCC to drop a potential 20% limit on tokenized reserve holdings and to allow specific Treasury ETFs to qualify as acceptable reserves. The stakes for large asset managers watching the stablecoin rules are high, as Visa, BlackRock Stablecoin Push Tops Crypto KOL Sentiment shows.
Questions about state authority remain unresolved. A bipartisan group of senators has pressed Treasury to define how states can preserve their regulatory functions. New York’s Department of Financial Services drafted its own framework harmonized with the GENIUS Act, though modifications may be needed once federal standards are finalized.
The missed deadline does not nullify the law or delay the enforcement date. Regulations finalized after Sept. 20 would lose the ability to accelerate the effective date. That gives regulators a limited window for action.
Anchorage Digital, a federally chartered crypto bank, used the one-year milestone to push for congressional approval of the CLARITY Act, legislation that would expand regulatory frameworks across the broader digital asset ecosystem. The CLARITY Act advanced through the Senate Banking Committee in May, though its prospects for passage in 2026 remain unclear. Galaxy Digital estimated a 50% probability of enactment in June.
Stablecoin issuers continue preparations based on draft rules that could see significant revisions.
Drafted by a large language model from the source reporting linked above, then screened by automated publishing checks. It is not read by a journalist before publication. Some articles cite our Alpha Score. Verify prices and figures against the original source. Educational coverage, not personalized advice.