Should Congress prevent banks from charging for pass-through digital dollar wallets?

Awaiting Vote
Bill Summary

This bill requires Federal Reserve member banks to provide digital pass-through accounts (i.e., digital dollar wallets) to residents and citizens, and to businesses domiciled in the United States. These accounts must provide specified banking services to eligible persons who elect to deposit funds into these accounts, including access to COVID-19 (i.e., coronavirus disease 2019) aid payments. A pass-through digital dollar wallet is a wallet application that stores electronic information of several cards for payment. Sponsor: Sen. Sherrod Brown (Democrat, Ohio)
View full bill text ➔

How do you feel?

One click sends your opinion

Opponents say

• “It is a big complex problem and it is a problem that we take very seriously and again I think it’s our obligation to understand it well … At the same time, there are some very serious questions that we have to answer before we want to implement [the CBDC]... If you create a central bank digital currency you can know every payment by everybody and that’s not good. If you don’t know any payments by anybody the worst thing is that there’s money laundering” Source: Honorable Jerome Powell (Chairman of the Federal Reserve)

Proponents say

• “At the height of this pandemic we must do more to protect the financial wellbeing of hardworking Americans and consumers. They are on the front lines of this crisis and are already feeling the effects of the economic fallout. My legislation would allow every American to set up a free bank account so they don’t have to rely on expensive check cashers to access their hard-earned money. I look forward to continuing to negotiate with my colleagues, and urge them to prioritize people over big banks and corporations.” Source: Sen. Sherrod Brown (Democrat, Ohio)
• “ I … started Paxos to modernize the financial market infrastructure that our economy relies on every day. We believe it’s important to create a more transparent and open financial system which better fosters and achieves customer inclusion and market competition. One that is built for a digital age, that runs 24/7, where money and other assets can be transferred instantaneously in a trustworthy way.” Source: Charles Cascarilla (Co-founder of Paxos)
• “The COVID-19 crisis has revealed fundamental shortcomings in the capacity of existing government payment relationships to swiftly channel financial resources to the non-banked public. The US Federal Reserve has no direct relations or connectivity with the non-banked public. It cannot therefore distribute or coordinate crisis relief to resident households. Away from the Federal Reserve, Federal and State government agencies have only partial direct banking relationships with the general public through tax and social benefits but their reach is not universal. Had a US CBDC been in circulation during the COVID-19 crisis, it would have enabled the sending of monetary relief instantaneously to the digital wallets of targeted beneficiaries.” Source: The Honorable J. Christopher Giancarlo (Former Chairman of US CFTC)