Will a new law make cryptocurrency safer?

July 30, 2025, Opinion: "On July 18, President Donald Trump signed the GENIUS Act, the first major piece of American legislation aimed at regulating cryptocurrency. The law, boosted by a bipartisan group of legislators, targets stablecoins, a kind of digital currency whose value is pegged to a fiat currency, most commonly the U.S. dollar. While stablecoins have been praised for their ability to move money quickly and efficiently, they can also pose risks for consumers and the broader economy, says Professor Howell Jackson '82 of Harvard Law School. The goal of the new regulatory structure, he adds, is to make the U.S. a leader in digital currencies while protecting the public and preventing illegal activity. With the GENIUS Act, Jackson says, the U.S. “jumps into the lead” in regulating this increasingly popular type of asset, which currently has over $250 billion of tokens in circulation."