Speaking on the sidelines of the IMF and World Bank Spring Meetings in Washington, D.C., Bailey told reporters that progress on coordinated global stablecoin standards has slowed over the past year. The remarks carry particular weight because Bailey also serves as Chair of the Financial Stability Board (FSB), the G20 body responsible for setting international financial regulatory standards. His dual role means the warning comes from both a major central bank and one of the world's primary cross-border financial rule-setting bodies.

The concern is not theoretical. The global stablecoin market closed 2025 at roughly $311 billion in total market capitalisation, and stablecoin transaction volume set a record of $33 trillion that year, led by USDC at $18.3 trillion and Tether's USDT at $13.3 trillion. Together, the two dollar-pegged tokens account for approximately 93 percent of total stablecoin market capitalisation. United Nations University projections put the market at as much as $4 trillion by 2030.

The regulatory picture has not kept pace. An FSB peer review published in October 2025 found that only five of 28 member jurisdictions had finalised frameworks specifically covering global stablecoin arrangements. Those five are the Bahamas, Bermuda, the European Union, Hong Kong, and Japan. Across a separate FSB dataset covering 29 surveyed jurisdictions, compiled as part of the FSB's 2026 work programme, just nine had even proposed or finalised stablecoin-specific legislation.

Six jurisdictions, including China and Saudi Arabia, maintain outright bans on crypto activity. In his April 2026 letter to G20 finance ministers, Bailey described the slowdown in reform implementation as requiring a root-cause analysis and corrective action, noting that regulatory divergence could add an additional layer of complexity and potential risk to cross-border stablecoin operations.

"It is important that authorities carefully consider how frameworks are designed to ensure they are effective, consistent, and supportive of safe innovation," Bailey wrote in that letter.

The fragmentation has concrete consequences for users and developers in regions where stablecoins already function as everyday financial infrastructure. Sub-Saharan Africa received approximately $205 billion in on-chain value in the twelve months to June 2025, a 52 percent increase year on year, with stablecoins representing roughly 43 percent of total regional crypto transaction volume. South Asia recorded around $300 billion in crypto transactions from January to July 2025, an 80 percent annual increase, with India ranking as the top country globally for crypto adoption. In Pakistan, where overseas remittances are a critical component of GDP, stablecoin rails cut the cost of a US-to-Pakistan transfer from above 3.5 percent to near zero. Bangladesh presents a stark contrast: a de facto ban on crypto has been in place since 2014, yet underground peer-to-peer adoption continues to expand, illustrating what the absence of global standards means at country level. Without harmonised international rules, the compliance environment at each end of any remittance corridor remains inconsistent and unpredictable.

The US and EU have both enacted domestic stablecoin frameworks, the GENIUS Act in 2025 and the Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation (MiCA) in 2024 respectively, but neither was designed with global interoperability or developing-economy use cases in mind. Both are oriented toward dollar- and euro-denominated issuance. African and South Asian regulators have largely been benchmarking off those frameworks despite the mismatch with their own cross-border trade corridors and remittance patterns. Analysts at the Center for Global Development and Chatham House have flagged that dollar-pegged stablecoin adoption in Africa risks eroding seigniorage revenues (the income governments earn from issuing currency) by an average of 1.0 to 1.5 percent of GDP annually. The systemic risks extend further: Standard Chartered has projected up to $1 trillion in deposit outflows from emerging market banks, including institutions in Nigeria, Egypt, and Pakistan, and the Bank for International Settlements has warned that widespread stablecoin adoption could undermine monetary sovereignty in developing economies.

Bailey's position is further complicated by his own stance on bank-issued stablecoins. He has previously warned major financial institutions against issuing stablecoins directly, favouring tokenised deposits on the grounds that stablecoin reserves must be ring-fenced and cannot be deployed for lending. In November 2025, the Bank of England launched a formal consultation on regulating systemic stablecoins denominated in sterling, with the comment period closing in February 2026 and final Codes of Practice expected later in 2026. That domestic action underscores his dual role: he is simultaneously calling for stronger global standards and building them at home. His stance on both fronts makes him one of the most prominent global voices calling for stablecoin regulation while remaining sceptical of allowing large banks to become stablecoin issuers.

The FSB's 2026 work programme includes dedicated stablecoin-focused deliverables, and Bailey has indicated that consultations are continuing. Regional regulators in countries like Pakistan, where the new Virtual Assets Act was signed into law in March 2026, and South Africa, which has had a live crypto framework since 2023, now have a narrow window to feed local perspectives into FSB discussions before global standards solidify. Across Africa more broadly, the regulatory landscape is evolving rapidly: Kenya signed its Virtual Asset Service Providers Bill into law in October 2025, Nigeria enacted its Investments and Securities Act in 2025 and the Central Bank of Nigeria relaxed its rules on bank engagement with digital asset service providers, and Mauritius has operated a dedicated virtual asset regulatory framework since 2021. Each of these jurisdictions brings a distinct cross-border use case to the table and a practical stake in how global standards are eventually drawn.

The FSB operates regional consultative groups that provide exactly this input channel. Whether jurisdictions across South Asia and Africa use it before the next round of peer reviews will go some distance in determining whether the next iteration of global stablecoin rules reflects the corridors where the technology is already most consequential.