The U.S. Senate has passed housing legislation that includes a prohibition on the Federal Reserve creating or working on a central bank digital currency (CBDC) until 2030, a measure that is expected to move quickly through the House and then to the president for signature.
In a vote on Monday, the Senate approved the 21st Century Road to Housing Act by 85–5. The CBDC restriction has been part of the bill since at least March, when the Senate passed an earlier version of the same housing package.
Key takeaways
- The Senate approved a clause barring the Federal Reserve from issuing or creating a CBDC (or a substantially similar digital asset) until 2030.
- The bill’s CBDC ban is now set to head to the House, where passage is expected soon given a bipartisan deal among House and Senate leaders.
- The restriction includes a safeguard: after the 2030 period ends, the Fed would still be unable to act on a CBDC without explicit congressional authorization.
- A carve-out preserves scope for stablecoins, including “dollar-denominated” tokens that are “open, permissionless, and private.”
- The U.S. move comes as other countries continue progressing with CBDC strategies, including China’s cross-border digital yuan rollouts.
What the Senate passed: a Fed CBDC pause through 2030
According to the bill text as previously described in coverage, the restriction bars the Federal Reserve from directly or indirectly “issue or create a central bank digital currency or any digital asset that is substantially similar to a central bank digital currency.” The aim is to limit the Fed’s ability to develop CBDC-related initiatives during the moratorium period.
The Senate’s approval of the final language follows an earlier March passage of a Senate version that already contained a CBDC ban. That means the measure has already cleared at least one legislative checkpoint in both timing and substance before reaching Monday’s decisive vote.
Why housing legislation, and why now
The CBDC clause was folded into a housing package as a legislative “sweetener” designed to secure additional support and accelerate passage, particularly among House Republicans and the administration, after leaders reached agreement on how to move the bill forward. Earlier coverage by Cointelegraph described how lawmakers structured the overall deal to keep momentum on the housing agenda while incorporating the CBDC restriction.
For investors and crypto market participants, the significance is less about housing policy itself and more about what the ban signals for U.S. CBDC expectations. For years, many in the crypto industry and conservative policy circles have treated CBDCs as a pathway to expanding central bank control over money and payment rails—an objection that the language directly targets by limiting Fed authority.
A limited exception for stablecoins
While the ban restricts the Fed’s ability to create or issue a CBDC, the bill includes a carve-out for stablecoins. The restriction covers “dollar-denominated currency that is open, permissionless, and private,” effectively separating many stablecoin models from a CBDC framework as lawmakers define it in the text.
That distinction matters because it draws a line between federally-backed digital currency infrastructure and the broader ecosystem of privately issued dollar-linked tokens. It also leaves room for continued stablecoin activity, even while CBDC development at the Fed is paused.
The legislation further clarifies that even once the ban lifts in 2030, the Fed would still be blocked from acting on a CBDC without new, explicit congressional authorization—meaning the path back toward a U.S. CBDC would likely require renewed legislative approval rather than relying on existing authority.
Global CBDC momentum continues despite U.S. restraint
While the U.S. legislative process moves toward restricting the Fed, other jurisdictions are continuing to advance CBDC programs. Reuters reported on June 16 that China signed up 26 financial institutions to its digital yuan (e-CNY) cross-border payment platform, highlighting continued operational expansion beyond domestic use cases.
In parallel, the Atlantic Council’s CBDC Tracker (as referenced in reporting) indicates that three countries have officially launched CBDCs, 41 are in the pilot phase, 33 are in development, and 40 remain in research. The numbers underscore a key asymmetry: even if the U.S. slows its CBDC timetable, global experiments and deployments are still progressing elsewhere.
For market watchers, this creates a practical tension. Cross-border rails are becoming more competitive and more testable in other regions, while U.S. lawmakers are signaling constraints on the Fed’s ability to pursue a comparable CBDC model through at least 2030.
What happens next in the U.S. process
The bill will now go to the House for a vote. With a deal already reached among House leaders and the expectation of quick passage, the primary remaining hurdle is whether the House adopts the Senate-approved language as-is. If it does, the legislation would then move to the president for signature, turning the CBDC ban into law.
Readers should watch how the House handles the CBDC language and whether any amendments emerge around the stablecoin carve-out or the post-2030 authorization requirement—those details will likely shape how policymakers and regulators interpret the boundary between CBDCs and the existing dollar-linked token ecosystem.
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