As a crypto bill entered a silent phase in Congress, the Federal Reserve said last week that it is evaluating the issuance of a digital dollar and will release a report on the matter soon.
The United States does not intend to fall behind in the central bank digital currency (CBDC) race, currently led by China. The country’s Federal Reserve (FED) is advancing the investigation of a digital dollar, as announced this week by President Jerome Powell. Meanwhile, a bill that slipped through Congress a few weeks ago also suggests plans for a digital currency.
The Most Comprehensive Crypto Bill
On July 29, one of the broadest cryptocurrency projects for regulatory measures in this sector appeared in the United States of America Congress. Among what the legislative proposal suggests, it would intend to set up rules for decentralized finance (DeFi), a ban on the issuance of stablecoins, and new powers would be granted to the FED, allowing it to create a digital dollar.
The law for the protection of investors and the structure of the digital asset market is a 58-page document from the representative Don Beyer, who has not expressed interest in cryptocurrencies.
Overall, the project desires to create a comprehensive regulatory regime for digital assets, covering some edges in a single proposal.
One of the terms of this proposal is that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) would have to define which aspects of the cryptocurrency market fall under their respective jurisdictions.
On the other hand, one of the terms of the proposal by the SEC is to define what types of cryptocurrencies could be securities and which can be commodities.
Both issues have been at the center of discussions regarding the regulation of the sector in recent years. In this way, the project addresses a long-standing industry desire for regulatory clarity, as noted by Nikhilesh De in an article for CoinDesk.
Although the proposals seem favorable enough for this industry, the bill includes a ban on mixer services to avoid the anonymity associated with illegal behavior and a clause that could upset privacy advocates.
The Federal Reserve is Authorized to Issue a CBDC
One of the most prominent sections of Beyer’s project is that it broadly sets out how the United States of America should see stable coins. The United States of America should view digital assets as substitutes for dollars or other government-issued money. And in this regard, it seems to allow the FED to issue a CBDC based on Blockchain technology.
The bill explains that the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System can apply distributed ledger technology for the creation, distribution, and recording of all the operations that could involve digital Federal Reserve bills.
The bill went unnoticed by the digital currency community, possibly because his presentation ran in parallel with the controversy surrounding the crypto provision expanding current requirements for cryptocurrency users, included in the $ 1 trillion infrastructure bill.
By: Jenson Nuñez
