The Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act is landmark legislation aimed at creating a comprehensive regulatory framework for payment stablecoins in the U.S. Signed into law in July 2025, this first-of-its kind federal guidance lays policy groundwork for integrating digital assets into mainstream finance.
Estimates of the growth in stablecoin market capitalization range from $2 trillion to $4 trillion by 2028. In its Q1 2025 report, the U.S. Treasury’s Treasury Advisory Borrowing Committee cited the lower end of the range—an 8.5x increase from the current $234 billion market cap in 2025. The amount of block-chain enabled payments is projected to reach $7 trillion by 2027.
In interviews with ProSight Financial, Roy Ben-Hur, managing director and US digital asset financial services lead at Deloitte & Touche, shared insights on the regulatory climate, product developments, and decisions ahead for the banking industry as it comes to terms with technology and new forms of virtual money that will radically change global finance. Ben-Hur dives deeper on an upcoming webcast, “Digital Assets and the Genius Act: How Banks Can Prepare,” on November 13 at 1pm ET.
For a decade the U.S. government and regulators cautiously monitored the growth in digital assets, severely restricting their path into everyday finance. Now we’re moving rapidly to broad-based normalization and adoption in everyday finance. What changed?
I would call this a “shock and awe” approach from the current administration, legislators, and regulators in terms of driving market adoption. The landscape has shifted, leading to everything from the repeal of standing regulations to the review of the accounting and tax treatments of digital assets. We also see some states progressing now with issuing stablecoins of their own.
Can you touch on some of the use cases we expect to see for stablecoins coming out of the Genius Act?
From a pure payment perspective, the notion of stablecoin being a payment rail, first and foremost, and the ability to move money across borders, cheaper, faster, and in a programmable manner. That programmability is likely to be an appealing feature for a lot of institutions. Another use case is for corporate treasurers who will see this as a way to optimize accounts globally at different entities and a real-time way to send money anywhere day or night.
How will stablecoins affect bank deposits?
Citing the April report from the US Treasury, stablecoins could put $6.6 trillion of bank deposits at risk. It will depend on the functionality that stablecoins provide. If it’s just a payment rail, then the impact will be much smaller. But if it’s a stablecoin linked to a tokenized deposit or money market account that provides yield, that will create more of a flow away from traditional bank accounts into banks with deposits that are digital asset- or stablecoin-based.
What options do banks have for playing in the digital asset space? Sounds like doing nothing is not an option.
Doing nothing is the worst approach. Start by educating your leadership. Understand what the implications are for the industry and your bank. Even if you’re skeptical about digital assets, it helps to build some muscle memory in this space. Engage operations people, get your compliance people on board, and start thinking about risks and controls. It’s not that easy to jump in and accelerate this overnight, especially when you need talent onboard who understands it.
To learn more about digital assets, stablecoin use cases, and banks’ options for pursuing a digital asset-strategy, listen to ProSight’s Risk Readiness webcast with Ben-Hur, “Digital Assets and the Genius Act: How Banks Can Prepare,” at 1pm ET on November 13.
