The US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) finalized rules on Wednesday for payment stablecoin reserves, redemptions, and related custody activities, implementing the GENIUS Act — the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act — for entities under its jurisdiction. The OCC, an independent bureau of the Treasury Department that charters and supervises national banks and federal savings associations, oversees the types of institutions the rule directly covers.

Under the final rule, stablecoin issuers must maintain reserves worth at least as much as their outstanding stablecoins and must generally process redemption requests within two business days. Those two requirements form the operational core of the framework, setting how payment stablecoins must be backed and how quickly holders' redemption requests must be handled.

The requirements apply to national banks, federal savings associations and federal branches and their subsidiaries, as well as nonbank firms that seek or receive federal qualified issuer status, according to the agency's announcement. They also cover state-qualified issuers when the OCC has regulatory or enforcement authority over them; the GENIUS Act provides for qualified issuer status at both the federal and state level. The OCC detailed the rule in Bulletin 2026-50, with the full text published as a PDF.

Both the rule and the GENIUS Act — the federal stablecoin legislation signed into law in July 2025 — will take effect on Jan. 18, 2027, meaning covered entities are not subject to the new requirements until that date.

"We are providing a clear, practical framework for payment stablecoin innovation with strong standards for reserve backing, redemption, and risk management," Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan Gould said.

The final rule drops a proposed presumption that certain arrangements involving affiliates or related third parties violate the law's yield ban, so such arrangements will no longer be presumed unlawful by default. It retains the prohibition on issuers paying holders interest or yield solely for holding, using or retaining their stablecoins, and the agency said it retains authority to act against attempts to evade that prohibition.

The OCC said it will announce separately when it begins processing issuer applications and waiver requests — the process through which firms will be able to seek federal qualified issuer status. The agency and the Treasury Department will address Bank Secrecy Act, anti-money-laundering and sanctions requirements in separate rulemaking, leaving those compliance details to future rules.