Washington’s Fall Agenda Puts Crypto, Banking Rules in the Crosshairs

From “winning the AI race,” to making America the “crypto capital” of the world, the 2025 political sphere has raised a host of implications for business.

And while Congress is in its August recess, when the House of Representatives returns in early September, U.S. lawmakers will be sitting on a potent docket that could potentially reshape how Americans pay, bank and move money.

From crypto markets regulation to open banking and beyond, FinTech and financial services leaders are watching closely as lawmakers continue to advance agendas that could dramatically rewire payments and banking, including key policy frameworks like the CLARITY Act and the Unleashing AI Innovation in Financial Services Act.

It isn’t just Congress, either. Federal agencies like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and more are all weighing their own rulemaking and sharing new opinions on traditionally controversial questions, such as whether cryptocurrencies need to be registered as securities or who controls access to consumer financial data.

What happens next as it relates to the digital transformation of several key tentpoles across traditional financial services could very well be decided this fall.

Read more: GENIUS Act Makes Stablecoins Business-Ready 

One of the most immediate beneficiaries of the administration’s view toward deregulation has been the cryptocurrency sector.

In July, the first tangible piece of successful crypto policy in the U.S., the GENIUS Act regulating stablecoins, was signed into law.

“Everybody’s jumping into stablecoins right now,” Brett McLain, head of payments and blockchain at Kraken, told PYMNTS. “All the big banks, they’re talking about creating their own; others want to leverage existing ones.”

For over a decade, U.S. crypto policy has been mired in uncertainty. The SEC and the CFTC have offered overlapping and often conflicting interpretations of digital assets. Meanwhile, banks, FinTechs and payment providers have operated in legal gray zones, unsure which rules apply and which licenses are necessary. 

Building on the GENIUS Act momentum, the White House has endorsed legislation like the CLARITY Act, which would codify whether a token is a security or a commodity based on its features. The existing discussion draft of the CLARITY Act, which will continue its journey when Congress returns, requires the SEC to draft new rules that exempt certain offers or sales of ancillary assets from SEC registration, define what constitutes an investment contract, and tailor existing securities regulations to consider the unique characteristics of digital assets.

Still, this potential policy shift is not without risk that may end up impacting the rest of the financial sector. The American Banking Association, the Bank Policy Institute and dozens of state banking groups, for example, are asking Congress for a do-over of the GENIUS Act. 

Outside of crypto, the United States and China have released competing visions of the future of artificial intelligence (AI), with the U.S. seeking global leadership and China prioritizing open source AI models and cooperation among nations and organizations.

Read more: Institutional-Grade Custody Remains Missing Link in Crypto’s Mainstream Breakthrough 

Technology, innovation and new business models are reshaping the financial industry. In March, the White House handed down an executive order mandating that the federal government will stop issuing paper checks for disbursements, effective Sept. 30, and will stop accepting them for payments “as soon as practicable.”

At the same time, some of this transformation is being challenged by financial incumbents.

The so-called open banking rule, Rule 1033, for example, is being examined in the courts, where the CFPB has filed briefs indicating that the rule is unlawful and should be struck down. The rule mandates that covered financial institutions (banks, credit card issuers, digital wallets, etc.) must provide consumers and authorized third parties with access to financial data (e.g., balances, transaction history, upcoming bill info), free of charge, with strong privacy and security protections.

Rule 1033 remains technically in effect until vacated, but its enforceability is now unclear.

The PYMNTS Intelligence report “Consumer Sentiment About Open Banking Payments” found that 46% of consumers would be “highly willing” to use open banking for bill payments and financial services. Just 11% of consumers in the United States, however, have used open banking payment options in the last year.

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