USA – FLORIDA Trends and Developments Contributed by: Rebecca G. DiStefano, Jeannie Regidor and Marina Olman-Pal, Greenberg Traurig, P.A.
Permitted activities and prohibitions A licence or certificate of approval would authorise only issuance, redemption, reserve management (including purchasing, selling, holding and providing custodial services for reserve assets) and activities directly supporting those functions. Issuers: • would not be permitted to condition access to stablecoin services on the purchase of unrelated products or on agreements not to use competitors’ products; • would not be permitted to use names or marketing implying US government affiliation or endorsement; • would not be permitted to pay interest or yield solely for holding or using a payment stablecoin where federally prohibited; and • would not be permitted to pledge, rehypothecate or reuse reserve assets except in narrow cat- egories permitted by the GENIUS Act for margin obligations on permitted reserve investments, custodial obligations and limited liquidity manage- ment through US Treasury-backed repurchase agreements. Reserve, transparency and audit requirements Issuers would be required to maintain identifiable reserves of at least 100% of outstanding payment stablecoins, drawn from the GENIUS-permitted asset list (US coin and currency, demand deposits and insured shares within federal limits, Treasuries with maturities of 93 days or less, overnight repur- chase and reverse repurchase agreements backed by short-term Treasuries, registered government money market funds invested only in permitted reserves, and other approved liquid federal government assets, including tokenised forms where compliant). Issuers would publish a monthly reserve report on their web- site disclosing total outstanding stablecoins, reserve composition, average maturity and custody location. A registered public accounting firm would conduct a monthly examination of the reserve report. The CEO and CFO would submit a monthly certification to the OFR attesting to its accuracy. False certifications would constitute a second-degree misdemeanour. Redemption policies and fees would be publicly dis- closed, and fee changes would require seven days’ prior notice to consumers.
AML, sanctions and annual certifications The bill amends the Florida Control of Money Laun- dering in Money Services Businesses Act and the par- allel Florida Control of Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing in Financial Institutions Act to incorporate payment stablecoins. Issuers would be required to comply with the GENIUS Act’s AML and economic sanctions provisions, the Bank Secrecy Act, and cus- tomer identification and due diligence obligations. Each issuer would submit an annual certification to the OFR confirming that it has implemented an AML and economic sanctions compliance programme. The OFR would make those certifications available to the US Secretary of the Treasury upon request and could revoke a licence or certificate of approval for failure to certify, with referral authority to the US Attorney General or the Florida Attorney General for substan- tive violations. Federal threshold transition Issuers with consolidated outstanding issuance below USD10 billion could operate solely under state super- vision. An issuer reaching the USD10 billion threshold would, within 360 days, transition to the federal regu- latory framework jointly administered by the OFR and the applicable federal regulator, or cease new issuance until total issuance falls below the threshold. Federal waivers would be available, and the OFR could enter into joint supervision agreements with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. Issuers exceeding USD50 billion would prepare annual financial state- ments audited by a registered public accounting firm and publish them on the issuer’s website. Penalties for unlicensed activity The bill grafts the new regulatory regime onto Chapter 560’s existing penalty architecture. Wilful unlicensed activity involving payment stablecoins of USD300 or less in a 12-month period would be a first-degree mis- demeanour. The offence would escalate to a third- degree felony above USD300 and below USD20,000, a second-degree felony above USD20,000 and below USD100,000, and a first-degree felony above USD100,000. Fines could reach the greater of USD250,000 or twice the value of the stablecoins, with the multiplier increasing to five times and the cap to USD500,000 for repeat violations, and a civil penalty of up to the greater of value or USD25,000.
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