US and UK financial regulators met in London on July 8 to hammer out stablecoin policy as Washington moves from legislation to real implementation. The 13th UK-US Financial Regulatory Working Group brought together officials from both treasuries, central banks, and financial watchdogs to align on digital assets, tokenization, and cross-border oversight.
The US side briefed UK counterparts on how the GENIUS Act, which sets up a federal framework for payment stablecoins, is actually getting built out. Both governments agreed on one core principle: stablecoins should be backed one-to-one with real reserves. The Bank of England ditched its earlier idea of holding limits in favor of a cleaner £40 billion issuance cap instead.
This coordination matters because US stablecoin issuers will soon need access to UK markets, and vice versa. The US is already moving from the bill-writing phase into execution, giving crypto firms a federal path to operate. The UK is still completing its rulebook. The FCA will oversee issuance, custody and trading of qualifying stablecoins, while the Bank of England handles the ones deemed systemically risky. Without alignment, companies end up navigating two separate regimes.
The meeting also covered tokenization and the G20 Cross-border Payments Roadmap. UK officials highlighted their Wholesale Financial Markets Digital Strategy and the new Wholesale Digital Markets Champion role. No new binding agreements came out of it, but both sides restated backing for responsible growth of digital assets with consumer protection intact.
This piece is informational. It does not constitute financial or investment advice.
