The Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act, or GENIUS Act, is a United States federal statute for payment stablecoins. Congress.gov identifies S. 1582 as Public Law No. 119-27 after the President signed it on July 18, 2025.
The law has been enacted, but its main operating framework has a conditional effective date: the earlier of January 18, 2027, which is 18 months after enactment, or 120 days after the primary federal payment stablecoin regulators issue final implementing regulations. As of June 2, 2026, implementation remains in active proposed-rule and consultation stages, including Treasury, OCC, FDIC, FinCEN, and NCUA rulemakings.
Stablecoin Scope and Issuer Model
The GENIUS Act centers on “payment stablecoins,” defined as digital assets designed for payment or settlement where the issuer is obligated to convert, redeem, or repurchase the asset for a fixed amount of monetary value and represents, or creates the reasonable expectation, that it will maintain stable value. The statute excludes national currencies, deposits, and securities from that definition, while preserving specific securities-law treatment rules for qualifying instruments.
The Act limits U.S. issuance to “permitted payment stablecoin issuers,” subject to exceptions and safe harbors. Those issuers are grouped into three core categories: subsidiaries of insured depository institutions approved to issue payment stablecoins, federal qualified payment stablecoin issuers, and state qualified payment stablecoin issuers. This creates a dual federal-state structure rather than a single licensing pathway.
Key GENIUS Act Provisions
- Reserve backing: Permitted issuers must maintain identifiable reserves backing outstanding payment stablecoins on at least a one-to-one basis using U.S. currency, demand deposits, short-dated Treasury securities, certain repos and reverse repos, government money market fund shares, approved liquid federal assets, or qualifying tokenized forms of those assets.
- Redemption and disclosure: Issuers must publicly disclose redemption policies and associated fees, and publish monthly reserve composition data showing outstanding stablecoins and the amount, composition, tenor, and custody geography of reserve assets.
- AML and sanctions treatment: Permitted issuers are treated as financial institutions for Bank Secrecy Act purposes and are subject to federal laws on economic sanctions, anti-money laundering, customer identification, due diligence, records, suspicious activity monitoring, and transaction blocking or freezing capabilities.
- No government guarantee: Payment stablecoins are not backed by the full faith and credit of the United States, are not guaranteed by the U.S. government, and are not covered by FDIC deposit insurance or NCUA share insurance. Misrepresenting that status is prohibited.
- No issuer-paid yield: Permitted payment stablecoin issuers and foreign payment stablecoin issuers may not pay holders interest or yield solely for holding, using, or retaining a payment stablecoin.
Federal, State, and Foreign Issuer Oversight
The primary federal payment stablecoin regulators include the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Federal Reserve, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and National Credit Union Administration. Treasury chairs the Stablecoin Certification Review Committee, which also includes Federal Reserve and FDIC leadership.
State qualified issuers with no more than $10 billion in consolidated outstanding issuance may use state supervision if the state framework is substantially similar to the federal framework and receives required certification. Issuers that exceed the threshold generally must transition to federal oversight, stop new issuance until below the threshold, or obtain a waiver.
The Act also addresses foreign payment stablecoin issuers. Beginning July 18, 2028, digital asset service providers generally may not offer or sell a payment stablecoin to a U.S. person unless it is issued by a permitted payment stablecoin issuer or by a qualifying foreign issuer meeting statutory conditions. The framework is therefore relevant to U.S. exchanges, custodians, payment companies, issuers, and stablecoin users, but implementation details depend on final agency rules.
Status and Implementation Timeline
Federal implementation is underway. Treasury published an advance notice of proposed rulemaking on September 19, 2025. The OCC published a GENIUS Act proposed rule on March 2, 2026; Treasury proposed broad principles for state-level substantial similarity on April 3, 2026; FDIC and FinCEN-related proposed rules appeared on April 10, 2026; and NCUA published an additional proposal on May 18, 2026. Regulators are directed to promulgate implementing regulations by July 18, 2026. This profile should be reviewed when final rules are issued or when the effective-date trigger changes.
