Senate Passes Trump-Backed Stablecoin Bill in Win for Crypto (1)

The US Senate passed stablecoin legislation setting up regulatory rules for cryptocurrencies pegged to the dollar, in a landmark win for the ascendant crypto industry and President Donald Trump.

The 68-30 vote on Tuesday evening marked a rare moment of bipartisanship in the deeply divided Senate, despite Republicans blocking Democratic efforts to bar Trump from profiting from his many crypto ventures while in office.

A Trump-affiliated stablecoin already has a $2 billion market value.

The House has been pursuing its own legislation, including a more sweeping measure to regulate the broader crypto market. House lawmakers must now decide whether to take up the Senate bill or negotiate a compromise measure.

The stablecoin vote, years in the making, is the crypto industry’s most tangible return yet on the hundreds of millions of dollars it poured into electing a crypto-friendly Congress. Crypto titans who flooded money into last year’s election with the best-funded alliance of corporate political action committees in US history have similar plans for the 2026 midterm elections.

Dollar-pegged stablecoins would have to hold dollar-for-dollar reserves in short-term government debt or similar products overseen by state or federal regulators.

Industry backers hope the legislation will turn stablecoins into a mainstream form of payment. Retailers had signed on to the bill with the idea that they can provide a cheaper, faster way to process transactions than traditional banking products like credit cards and checks.

Read More: Crypto Is Investing in Democrats to Advance Agenda in Congress

Banks, especially smaller ones, have warned about a potential drain on deposits and reduced access to credit. Larger banks are considering issuing their own stablecoins, which generate profits from interest on the reserves.

Stablecoins are already a lucrative business, with leading issuer Tether Holdings SA earning billions on its reserves.

Technology companies and other large non-financial businesses could also issue their own stablecoins if the bill becomes law, potentially upending a longstanding separating of finance and business.

Various efforts to amend the measure on the Senate floor failed, including amendments targeting Trump, credit card competition, consumer protections and the threat of future government bailouts of stablecoins, which would not be protected by federal deposit insurance.

Explainer: What Are Stablecoins and Why Are Regulators Wary?

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Scott, a South Carolina Republican, said in a statement Tuesday that the legislation is “bringing clarity to a sector that’s been clouded by uncertainty.”

He has told Bloomberg that he expects to hold a hearing on a broader crypto market structure bill in July, but does not anticipate passage in the Senate until the fall.

Backers, including the president and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, have touted dollar-pegged stablecoins for their potential to increase demand for dollars and US debt globally.

Several Democrats led by Senator Elizabeth Warren argued that the stablecoin bill doesn’t do enough to protect consumers and the financial system if issuers fail, leaving customers vulnerable to losing their money and fueling demands for taxpayer bailouts. Warren, the ranking member on Senate Banking, said Tuesday the bill would “supercharge the value of Donald Trump’s corruption.”

Senator Bill Hagerty, a Tennessee Republican and his party’s lead sponsor of the measure, said he’d spoken with Trump and that he was looking forward to getting the legislation on his desk “in very short order.”

The senator said he hoped the House passes the bill “as quickly as they possibly can.”

A House GOP aide told Bloomberg that both the stablecoin and market structure bills are necessary to create a comprehensive and durable framework for digital assets, and they will continue working with their colleagues to pass both bills.

Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, a senior Republican member of the Banking Committee, warned the House not to amend the Senate’s bill. “If the House amends it and sends it back it’ll be dead on arrival,” he said, predicting Democrats would block changes.

(Updates with additional comments from lawmakers.)

To contact the reporters on this story:
Steven T. Dennis in Washington at sdennis17@bloomberg.net;
Yash Roy in Washington at yroy@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Megan Scully at mscully32@bloomberg.net

Magan Crane, John Harney

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