A Federal Reserve (Fed) Governor has declared the start of a new chapter for the agency’s posture on crypto and shared their goal to actively participate in the “tech-driven revolution” of the payments system.

Crypto, DeFi ‘Woven’ Into The Payment Systems

On Tuesday, Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller affirmed that a “new era” for the federal agency had begun, signaling a shift toward the crypto industry and other emerging sectors.

At the Payments Innovation Conference in Washington, DC, the Governor discussed how the Fed aims to embrace and actively participate in the “tech-driven revolution” of the payments system, led by the crypto and Decentralized Finance (DeFi) sectors.

In his opening remarks, Waller explained that the conference goal is to have a “vibrant discussion” on how the new technologies are entering the mainstream payment ecosystems, while addressing the Fed’s new approach toward DeFi and crypto.

I wanted to send a message that this is a new era for the Federal Reserve in payments—the defi industry is not viewed with suspicion or scorn. Rather, today, you are welcomed to the conversation on the future of payments in the United States and on our home field—something that would have been unimaginable a few years ago.

He explained that multiple technological advances are transforming the payment system, including stablecoins, tokenized assets, and artificial intelligence (AI), adding that the convergence of these innovations with the traditional financial ecosystem “is demanding change everywhere.”

Therefore, Waller considers that public institutions, including the Federal Reserve, must acknowledge and embrace private-sector innovation that can improve the payment system while preserving its safety and stability.

“This is an acknowledgement that distributed ledgers and crypto-assets are no longer on the fringes but increasingly are woven into the fabric of the payment and financial systems,” he remarked.

‘Skinny’ Master Accounts For Payment Innovation

The Federal Reserve Governor shared he had asked the agency’s staff to explore the creation of a “payment account” to “support those actively transforming the payment system.” As he explained, the payment account would be available to all institutions that are legally eligible and could be beneficial for those focused on payment innovations.

“This payment account concept would be targeted to provide basic Federal Reserve payment services to legally eligible institutions that right now conduct payment services primarily through a third-party bank that has a full-fledged master account,” he detailed.

According to Waller, the goal is to tailor the services of these new accounts to the needs of the eligible firms, like innovative banks, asset managers, retail payments firms, stablecoin issuers, technology companies, as well as crypto-native fintechs, and to “the risks they present to the Federal Reserve Banks and the payment system.”

“Payment innovation moves fast, and the Federal Reserve needs to keep up,” the Governor affirmed. He explained the prototype of the “skinny master account,” which would provide limited access to the Federal Reserve payment rails while controlling for various risks.

It’s worth noting that Federal Reserve Banks provide access to master accounts and financial services to legally eligible entities following the agency’s guidelines. The new limited accounts would not have daylight overdraft privileges. They would also not be eligible for discount window borrowing or have access to all Federal Reserve payment services for which the Reserve Banks cannot control the risk of daylight overdrafts, Waller added.

“I want to be clear that this is just a prototype idea to provide some clarity on how things could change. The upshot is that, in my view, the payments landscape, as well as the types of providers, has evolved dramatically in recent years, and, accordingly, a new payments account could better reflect this new reality.”

Ultimately, Governor Waller stated that the federal agency will engage with all interested stakeholders and crypto firms to discuss perspectives on the benefits and drawbacks of this approach.