ConsenSys files comments on FDIC stablecoin rules

ConsenSys said on May 18 that it filed a formal comment letter on the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s proposed rule for payment stablecoins, joining a widening industry push to shape how the GENIUS Act is translated into bank supervision. The filing targets the FDIC’s April 7 proposal for FDIC-supervised permitted payment stablecoin issuers, or PPSIs, and insured banks involved in stablecoin activities. ConsenSys framed its letter as part of a coordinated set of submissions that also included comments to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency on May 1 and a separate Treasury Department filing on state-regime standards. ### Which FDIC rule is ConsenSys trying to change? The FDIC approved its core GENIUS Act notice of proposed rulemaking on April 7, 2026. The agency said that proposal would set requirements for FDIC-supervised payment stablecoin issuers, require identifiable reserve assets, impose capital and risk-management standards, and generally require redemption within two business days. The proposal also addresses custodial and safekeeping requirements and says reserve deposits backing a payment stablecoin would not receive pass-through deposit insurance for coin holders. (consensys.io) May 22 brought a separate FDIC proposal on Bank Secrecy Act and sanctions compliance for the same category of issuers. The FDIC said that second proposal would require PPSIs to comply with applicable AML/CFT, sanctions and reporting rules, including requirements set by FinCEN and the Office of Foreign Assets Control. (fdic.gov) ### What are the four changes ConsenSys asked for? ConsenSys said its FDIC filing focuses on four areas: yield restrictions and third-party distribution, non-custodial software and DeFi access, supervisory discretion over mandatory consequences, and technology-neutral definitions including crosschain representations. The company said those points need refinement in the final rule. (fdic.gov) Bill Hughes, who authored the ConsenSys post describing the filing, said the first objection concerns the FDIC’s proposed rebuttable presumption extending the GENIUS Act’s yield prohibition to “related third parties.” ConsenSys said the statute bars the issuer of a payment stablecoin from paying yield to holders, but does not bar independent distribution partners from offering benefits tied to their own commercial operations. (consensys.io) ### Why is the “related third parties” issue getting attention? Section 4(a)(11) of the GENIUS Act is the hook for this dispute, according to ConsenSys. The company said the FDIC’s draft reaches beyond the statute by capturing ordinary commercial arrangements, including brand licensing, and argued that Congress considered broader third-party restrictions and rejected them. ConsenSys proposed a four-condition standard based on common-law agency principles to separate evasion from routine business activity. (consensys.io) Crowdfund Insider, which reported the filing on May 22, said this was one of the most prominent revisions sought by the company. The outlet said ConsenSys presented the issue as a question of statutory fit as well as implementation. (consensys.io) ### How does the filing treat wallets and DeFi? ConsenSys said the final FDIC rule should confirm that non-custodial wallet software is not a regulated intermediary when a user independently deploys stablecoins into a DeFi protocol and earns protocol-native yield. The company cited what it described as a self-custodial software carve-out in the GENIUS Act and said existing guidance from FinCEN, federal courts and international regulators supports that treatment. (crowdfundinsider.com) The same filing also backs parts of the FDIC proposal that it said are more workable than the OCC’s version. ConsenSys said the FDIC should preserve discretionary supervisory responses to reserve, redemption and capital shortfalls rather than impose automatic consequences. It also asked for functional, technology-neutral definitions of distributed ledger and smart contract, and for crosschain representations to be evaluated by the legal nature of the holder’s claim rather than the technical mechanism used. (consensys.io) ### What happens next in the rulemaking? The FDIC said comments on both the April 7 GENIUS Act proposal and the May 22 BSA and sanctions proposal will be accepted for 60 days after publication in the Federal Register. The next formal step is the close of those comment periods, after which the agency can revise the proposals before issuing final rules for FDIC-supervised payment stablecoin issuers and affiliated insured banks. (consensys.io) (fdic.gov)