Biden Administration and Members Of Congress are Making Progress on Stablecoin: Bloomberg

A top U.S. Treasury official said the Biden administration and members of Congress are making progress toward crafting guardrails for fast-growing stablecoins, which U.S. officials have warned could pose systemic dangers, reported Bloomberg.
There's "broad agreement" that risks posed by stablecoins need to be addressed -- especially given the market's growth, the report quoted Nellie Liang, the department's undersecretary for domestic finance.
Stablecoins are a fast-growing cryptocurrency whose value is pegged to another asset, like a traditional currency or commodity. The outstanding value of all stablecoins has grown to more than $175 billion from about $5 billion in 2020, the report cited Liang.
In November, the Treasury and a group of federal agencies appealed to Congress to act to address "key gaps" in regulatory authority over stablecoins.
Related: Biden Administration Calls For Stablecoin Regulation: Report
The report quoted Liang commenting that the Federal Reserve's plans for a real-time payments system might provide some of the benefits that advocates hope to see from a central bank digital currency and built-in protections for the financial system.
The coming system, known as FedNow, aims to make inexpensive, near-instant interbank payments available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, before the end of 2023. That could make bank accounts more useful and attractive to the estimated 5% of U.S. households that currently don't have accounts.
President Joe Biden signed an executive order earlier this month that directed several federal agencies to dedicate more attention to the study and prospective regulation of digital assets.