The U.S. Department of the Treasury has published a draft rule regulating the issuance and circulation of payment stablecoins in the American market, establishing mandatory licensing for issuers and strict requirements for foreign tokens. The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) for implementing Section 3 of the $GENIUS Act appeared on the agency's official website on August 17, 2026, and defines a new framework for the entire digital asset industry within the jurisdiction of the United States.
Key Dates and Licensing Requirements
The document was officially filed in the Federal Register on August 18, 2026, which started the 60-day period for public comments, ending on October 19, 2026. According to the draft text, as of January 18, 2027, issuing a payment stablecoin in the U.S. will only be possible if the issuer holds the appropriate federal or state license. This date is the statutory deadline for the regime to take effect if final implementing rules are not adopted earlier by the primary regulators.
The $GENIUS Act was signed on July 18, 2025, and stipulates that the norms will take effect 18 months after enactment or 120 days after the release of final rules, whichever occurs first. The full text of the proposed regulations is available on the Treasury Department's website and contains detailed definitions of key terms, including the concept of "issuance" as the initial transfer of a coin by an issuer, as a result of which another person obtains the right to use, transfer, or redeem the asset.
Regulation of Foreign Issuers and Prohibitions
Separate conditions are established for foreign providers seeking access to the American market. Digital asset providers will not be able to offer or sell foreign stablecoins to customers in the U.S. if the issuer does not have the technical capability to comply with lawful orders from U.S. authorities and does not meet the conditions of mutual agreements between jurisdictions. Admission of foreign companies is also possible if the Treasury Department recognizes the supervisory regime in the country of origin as comparable to the American one and if the issuer registers with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).
Effective July 18, 2028, a complete ban is introduced for digital asset service providers on offering or selling any payment stablecoins to persons in the U.S. if such coins are issued by an unlicensed issuer. This date directly follows from the provisions of the law and is indicated by the agency in the explanatory notes to the draft. However, the regulatory act contains exceptions for direct transfers of digital assets between individuals without an intermediary and for certain operations involving users' self-custodied wallets, preserving room for decentralized trading.
Position of U.S. Treasury Leadership
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated that the new rules are designed to provide businesses with regulatory certainty, stimulate innovation and economic growth within the country, and strengthen the role of the dollar as the world's reserve currency. According to him, the administration aims to maintain America's status as the cryptocurrency capital of the world and is moving quickly to implement the framework system created by Congress. He published a similar message on social network X, emphasizing the importance of stakeholder input in shaping the final standards.
The presented draft creates a clear legal architecture for the stablecoin market, replacing previous uncertainty with specific licensing procedures and adaptation timelines. The established requirements form a basis for integrating digital dollar assets into the traditional financial system while maintaining mechanisms of state control and protection of the national currency.
AI Opinion
From the perspective of machine data analysis, the American Treasury initiative repeats a trajectory already taken by the European Union: in 2024, the region introduced mandatory reserve and licensing requirements for stablecoin issuers under the MiCA regulation, and practice has shown that even the largest market player, Tether, chose to leave the region rather than undergo licensing. A similar scenario is not excluded for the U.S.: strict requirements for foreign issuers may push part of global liquidity towards jurisdictions with softer oversight, rather than bringing the entire market under the control of the dollar. A technical aspect remaining outside the scope of the article is the requirement for foreign issuers to provide U.S. regulators with the technical capability to block or freeze transactions, which requires architectural changes in the token protocols themselves. Will the structure of stablecoins remain flexible enough for such integration, or will the market split into "American" and "rest of the world" contours?
