Signal US stablecoin legislation in July 2025 pulls banks into the sector for the first time since 2022

Summary

Institutional interest in stablecoins reached a new high in 2025, helped by new US legislation. CB Insights links the change to the GENIUS Act, passed in July 2025, which gave banks and other financial institutions the regulatory clarity they had lacked. Enterprise use cases also widened over the same period. Major US and European banks backed five stablecoin startups during the year, the first such bank-backed deals since 2022, covering payment infrastructure, compliance and business-to-business payments. Mentions of stablecoins on corporate earnings calls also spiked. Together these signals suggest that traditional finance is moving from watching the sector to participating in it.