The Bank of Italy said in a research report released in July 2026 that it conducted a “mystery shopper” study to track 200 USDC transfers across 10 remittance corridors linking Italy with Argentina, Brazil, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates, and Japan. The study followed the full payment chain and found that total stablecoin remittance costs varied widely, from as low as 0.3% to nearly 9%. According to the report, on-chain blockchain transfer fees accounted for an average of just 0.4% of the total. Most of the cost came from fiat on- and off-ramp steps, including exchange spreads, credit card fees, and withdrawal charges. Compared with traditional services such as Wise, stablecoins were cheaper on some routes, including Brazil to Italy, but more expensive on others, including the United Arab Emirates to Italy. The report also found that blockchain settlement itself took only a few minutes, while end-to-end speed depended on local payment infrastructure. Countries with instant payment systems, such as Brazil’s PIX, Italy’s TIPS, and Argentina’s Transferencias 3.0, could complete the process in under 20 minutes. In South Africa and other markets still reliant on bank transfers, settlement could take one to two business days.

President Donald Trump used a White House meeting with crypto and technology executives on Wednesday to push Congress to advance the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, saying lawmakers need to take the next step on crypto market structure. His call for a “fair version” of the bill pointed to the language dispute that has kept the measure stuck in the Senate for months. Trump framed the legislation as part of U.S. competition with China and linked it to his administration’s digital asset agenda, including a strategic bitcoin reserve, a digital asset stockpile, a ban on a U.S. central bank digital currency, and the GENIUS Act. The bill needs 60 votes in the Senate, where Republicans are still roughly seven Democrats short, and it is set to return in September after no procedural vote was held before the August recess. The meeting included top executives from Coinbase, Ripple, Robinhood, Nasdaq, ICE, Kraken, Chainlink, Blockchain.com, Gemini and a16z crypto, along with SEC Chair Paul Atkins, CFTC Chair Michael Selig and White House crypto adviser Patrick Witt.

Taiwan’s Virtual Asset Service Act cleared its third reading on June 30, 2026 and was promulgated on July 22, formally putting virtual asset service providers under a dedicated legal regime. But former premier and former Financial Supervisory Commission chairperson Chen Ching said the law’s success should not be judged by how many licenses are issued. His main test is whether the government gives the sector sustained attention at the highest level. Speaking on episode 100 of XREX Group’s podcast Web3 Big Westward Expansion, Chen said the hardest questions begin after passage of the law: how Taiwan wants to develop virtual assets and stablecoins, who has final authority when agencies disagree, and whether firms will get a review process that is clear and predictable. He pointed to a structural issue in the law’s stablecoin provisions, where the Financial Supervisory Commission is the competent authority but approval for issuance also requires the central bank’s consent. Chen argued that stablecoins should be viewed not only as a financial product subject to compliance rules, but also through the lens of monetary sovereignty and national strategy. XREX co-founder and Group CEO Wayne Huang added that if trading can remain legally onshore, local currency has a chance to remain on-chain as well, especially as tokenized real-world assets become more important.

Circle co-founder, chairman and CEO Jeremy Allaire used a nearly 47-minute Q2 2026 investor AMA on Aug. 19 to answer 11 questions spanning USDC adoption, Arc’s roadmap, CPN expansion, EURC growth, AI agent payments and U.S. crypto legislation. His central message was that stablecoins and onchain finance are still early, even as they start moving well beyond crypto-native trading into cross-border settlement, treasury management, capital markets and machine-to-machine payments. Allaire said Circle’s strongest execution edge comes from long-built cross-functional coordination, disciplined hiring and growing internal use of AI across the company. He described reserve income as a durable core economic engine for Circle, while arguing that transaction and infrastructure revenue should expand as USDC distribution scales and new products such as CPN and Arc mature. He framed Arc as an "economic operating system" and said its public mainnet is scheduled to launch on Sept. 16. On product traction, Allaire said more than 175 financial institutions have joined CPN, EURC circulation has surpassed €400 million, and over 99% of agent payments on protocols such as x402 are using USDC. He also said GENIUS Act coming into force in January should support stablecoin growth in the U.S., but argued USDC adoption would keep rising even if the CLARITY Act does not pass in September because demand is global and much of current stablecoin usage already sits outside the United States.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, or OCC, said it plans to publish final rules for payment stablecoins before November, giving the market a clearer timeline ahead of the GENIUS Act’s effective date in January 2027. Speaking at the Wyoming Blockchain Symposium on Wednesday the 19th, OCC Comptroller Jonathan Gould said the agency is working toward finalizing its rulemaking after reviewing industry feedback on a 376-page Notice of Proposed Rulemaking released in February. He also said regulators are expected to begin accepting applications from stablecoin issuers as early as 2027. The timetable matters because the GENIUS Act, signed into law by Donald Trump in July 2025, requires agencies including the OCC, the U.S. Treasury, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Federal Reserve to complete implementing rules by Jan. 18, 2027. So far, no federal agency has released a final rule. The article notes that the OCC could become the first federal banking regulator to complete the process if it meets its November target, while the final text will shape standards around 1:1 reserves, redemption commitments, capital, reporting and the long-debated question of whether stablecoins may pay interest.

President Donald Trump used a July 20 White House roundtable with regulators and senior executives from major crypto, finance and technology firms to lay out a friendlier U.S. posture toward digital assets. The event brought together leaders from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Securities and Exchange Commission, Coinbase, ICE, Nasdaq, Robinhood, Kraken, Ripple, Chainlink and others, with the discussion centered on market leadership, crypto legislation and financial innovation inside the United States. Trump highlighted the GENIUS Act, which he said he signed a year earlier, and urged Congress to move quickly on the Clarity Act, a bill designed to draw a legal line between crypto securities and crypto commodities. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said during the meeting that Congress plans to vote on the Clarity Act on Sept. 15. Regulators also outlined fresh policy moves. CFTC Chair Mike Selig said the first fully compliant Bitcoin perpetual futures contract in the U.S. launched in May 2026 on a CFTC-registered exchange, and said the agency is working on a framework to bring decentralized trading protocol Hyperliquid into the U.S. legally. SEC Chair Paul Atkins said the agency has proposed a new crypto asset rule to address how startups can raise equity and capital through digital assets. Trump also said he is open to expanding the U.S. Bitcoin reserve, subject to advice from his regulatory team.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board has issued a proposed accounting standards update that would clarify when digital assets can qualify as cash equivalents under U.S. GAAP. In practical terms, a qualifying stablecoin could appear on the same balance-sheet line as Treasury bills, commercial paper, and money market funds, though the definition of cash equivalents itself would not change. Instead, FASB would add illustrative examples under cash flow statement guidance, pointing to assets that carry an on-demand contractual redemption right with the issuer for a known amount of cash, maintain segregated reserves of at least one-to-one in short-term highly liquid assets, and disclose those reserves annually. The proposal also says any entity presenting cash equivalents would need to disclose their significant components each year, whether or not the company uses crypto. Comments are due by Nov. 19, and the board will set an effective date after reviewing feedback. The move comes after differing treatment of assets such as USDC across companies, and alongside broader U.S. stablecoin rulemaking, including the GENIUS Act and a Treasury proposal released on Monday.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is expected to complete final rulemaking tied to the GENIUS Act before November, according to remarks cited by crypto journalist Eleanor Terrett on Aug. 20. Speaking at the SALT Conference in Wyoming, an OCC official said digital-asset-related charter approval activity has increased eightfold compared with the Biden administration period. The same official also criticized the prior administration’s attempt to pursue what was described as “de-risking,” calling that approach “extremely short-sighted.” The OCC official added that the agency plans to revise the rules based on feedback from the crypto industry as it moves toward finalizing the framework.