If you hold stablecoins, the rules around them are being rewritten right now. The problem is that lawmakers in Washington, Brussels, and even Delaware do not seem to agree on what a stablecoin is supposed to be in the first place.
In the U.S., the draft CLARITY Act would bar platforms from paying any form of interest simply for holding a payment stablecoin.
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In Europe, Circle is lobbying for looser rules because the current framework may already be strangling euro stablecoin growth before it starts.
And in Delaware, lawmakers are taking a third path entirely, just regulate stablecoin issuers like part of the banking system and move on.
The U.S. view
The American approach is increasingly clear, even if the bill itself is still only a draft. The latest text of the CLARITY Act says providers may not pay “any form of interest or yield” solely for holding a payment stablecoin, while leaving room for activity-based rewards tied to payments, transfers, or DeFi participation.
Senators Thom Tillis and Angela Alsobrooks reached an “agreement in principle” on this language with the White House on March 20, though the bill still needs to clear committee and pass both chambers.
The logic is as political as it is regulatory. Traditional savings accounts currently yield 0.01–0.50% annually. And some crypto platforms have been offering 3.5–4% on stablecoin deposits.
This is a gap so big that banking lobbyists argue could trigger deposit outflows from the traditional financial system. So the U.S. is moving toward a model where stablecoins can circulate freely as payment instruments but cannot quietly become competitive with ordinary bank deposits by paying passive interest.
If that rule holds, expect crypto platforms to restructure rewards around activity rather than balances, for example trading incentives, payments bonuses, and liquidity mining rather than anything that resembles a savings rate.
Europe’s problem
Europe has almost the opposite issue. The regulatory framework already exists, MiCA took effect in late 2024, but Circle argues it may be so restrictive that it chokes adoption before it really gains traction.
In its formal response to the European Commission’s Market Integration Package, sent March 20, Circle described the package as a “meaningful step toward a digitally enabled financial system” while pushing for changes on two fronts.
First, the market-cap threshold that governs which e-money tokens qualify as “significant” and can be widely used for institutional settlement creates what Circle called a “chicken-and-egg scenario”: no euro stablecoin, including EURC, has yet reached the threshold needed for broader settlement use, so it cannot grow into the role the framework theoretically allows.
Circle asked the Commission to replace the fixed capital benchmark with more flexible thresholds based on market uptake and liquidity conditions.
Second, Circle wants crypto-asset service providers admitted to the EU DLT Pilot Regime, which currently restricts cash accounts to credit institutions and central securities depositories, leaving blockchain-native operators largely on the sidelines of regulated capital market settlement.
Delaware’s route
Then there is Delaware, where lawmakers just took a more state-level and operational path.
Senators Spiros Mantzavinos and Representative Bill Bush introduced Senate Bill 19, the Delaware Payment Stablecoin Act, alongside Senate Bill 16, the Delaware Banking Modernization Act, the first major overhaul of Delaware’s banking code since 1981.
SB 19 would create a licensing framework for stablecoin issuers and digital asset service providers under the State Bank Commissioner, with requirements drawn from federal models including the GENIUS Act: 1:1 reserve ratios backed by high-quality liquid assets, monthly audits, mandatory redemption timelines, capital standards, AML and KYC obligations, and custody safeguards.
Governor Matt Meyer has backed the proposal. Both bills are currently assigned to the Senate Banking, Business, Insurance and Technology Committee.
Delaware is not solving the global stablecoin debate with this move. But it is demonstrating a third instinct: instead of arguing about whether stablecoins are dangerous or underpowered, just treat them as a licensed part of the financial system and regulate them accordingly.
What survives
Taken together, these three stories show that there is no shared stablecoin endgame yet. The U.S. wants to strip out passive yield to protect banks.
Europe is being pushed to loosen a framework that may already be too tight to work. Delaware wants to normalize issuance through familiar banking law.
It looks like the future of stablecoins will not be decided by adoption alone. What will be the catalyst?
Which legal model actually lets them grow, without either draining the banks or keeping euro stablecoins permanently too small to matter.
Crypto market researcher and external contributor at Kriptoworld
Wheel. Steam engine. Bitcoin.
📅 Published: March 25, 2026 • 🕓 Last updated: March 25, 2026
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