Washington Finally Asks to Join the Group Chat: Treasury's GENIUS Act NPRM Opens for Comment

The U.S. Department of the Treasury has dropped its first proposed rulemaking under the GENIUS Act, kicking off a 60-day public comment period starting April 1, 2026.

This marks the Treasury's inaugural regulation to implement the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act, which became law on July 18, 2025. The act mandates 1:1 reserve backing with liquid assets, monthly disclosures, and AML and sanctions compliance.

Here's the deal for smaller players: issuers with $10 billion or less in outstanding stablecoins can opt into state regulatory oversight, provided their state framework gets certified as substantially similar to federal standards. Once certified, these issuers operate under state watch while still adhering to core federal requirements—think 100% reserves in high-quality liquid assets, on-demand par redemption, Bank Secrecy Act registration, and public disclosures.

Bigger names like Tether (USDT) at $184 billion and USDC at $77 billion? They're automatically in the federal lane, exceeding the $10 billion threshold and leaving state-level options off their table. Because apparently, when you're that big, Uncle Sam wants to hold your hand himself.

The public comment window runs 60 days from Federal Register publication. Input goes to regulations.gov. This follows a September 2025 advance notice that already gauged industry sentiment.

As of April 1, 2026, the stablecoin market sits at $310 billion, with 391 coins and a 24-hour trading volume exceeding $97 billion, per CoinGecko data.

The OCC, FDIC, and NCUA continue their parallel rulemakings to flesh out the GENIUS Act framework. Full implementation is projected for late 2026 or early 2027, which could unlock broader stablecoin adoption and new digital-asset use cases.

So yeah, Washington is officially in the stablecoin group chat. Better late than never, right?