US regulators miss GENIUS Act one-year deadline for final stablecoin rules

U.S. regulators have missed the one-year deadline to finalize stablecoin rules under the GENIUS Act, which was signed into law on July 18, 2025. Key regulations from the OCC, FDIC, and Treasury remain as proposals, creating uncertainty for the industry and for states like New York seeking to align their own frameworks. The missed deadline does not automatically delay the law's effective date, which is set for January 18, 2027, at the latest.

GENIUS Act deadline missed

• ▪The GENIUS Act is the first major standalone federal crypto framework to be passed by the U.S. Congress
• ▪U.S. regulators missed the July 18, 2026, one-year deadline to issue final stablecoin regulations under the GENIUS Act
• ▪The law does not specify a penalty or alternative timetable if federal agencies fail to finalize the rules within the one-year deadline
• ▪President Donald Trump signed the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act into law on July 18, 2025

Pending regulatory proposals

• ▪The NCUA's operational and risk-management proposal's comment period closed on July 17, 2026, one day before the statutory deadline
• ▪The OCC published its implementing proposal on March 2, 2026, covering reserves, capital, liquidity, and risk management
• ▪A joint proposal on customer identification from the Federal Reserve, FinCEN, OCC, FDIC, and NCUA remains open for public comment until August 21, 2026
• ▪As of the deadline, rule packages from the OCC, FDIC, NCUA, and Treasury Department remained at the proposal stage

Industry feedback on rules

• ▪In December 2025, Rep. Bryan Steil (R-Wis.) pressed agency officials to complete their GENIUS Act rules on time
• ▪BlackRock urged the OCC to remove a potential 20% cap on tokenized reserve assets and expand the list of eligible reserve assets
• ▪A bipartisan group of senators urged the Treasury Department in June 2026 to preserve the regulatory role of states

State regulatory framework uncertainty

• ▪New York’s Department of Financial Services has proposed its own GENIUS-aligned framework to meet the federal "substantially similar" standard
• ▪A Treasury Department proposal to determine when a state's regulatory framework is "substantially similar" to the federal regime remains unfinished
• ▪Issuers with no more than $10 billion in stablecoins could remain under state supervision if their state's framework is certified as "substantially similar."

Effective date mechanics

• ▪The missed deadline does not automatically postpone the GENIUS Act's effective date
• ▪Rules finalized after September 20, 2026, would no longer be able to move the law's effective date forward
• ▪The GENIUS Act is set to take effect on the earlier of January 18, 2027, or 120 days after primary federal regulators issue final rules