Warren demands Meta reveal stablecoin plans before Clarity Act

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, sent a letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg this week giving the company until May 20 to disclose the scope of its stablecoin experiments, partnerships and any financial ties. The request comes ahead of a possible Senate vote on the Clarity Act, a bill that would define and legalize many crypto activities in the United States.

Meta this month began a creator payments program that can send earnings in USDC stablecoin to crypto wallets on Solana and Polygon. The system routes payments through Stripe and supports wallets including MetaMask, Phantom and Binance. The program is currently limited to creators in Colombia and the Philippines. Meta has said it is not issuing its own stablecoin.

In her letter, Warren asked Meta to detail which experiments it is running with third-party stablecoin issuers, whether the company plans to favor a particular stablecoin over other payment methods, what privacy protections will apply to users, and whether there are any financial arrangements between Meta and a stablecoin issuer. She also requested information on technical and contractual arrangements.

Warren and Sen. Richard Blumenthal previously questioned Meta last spring about stablecoin plans. An executive responded then that the company had “no plans to issue a stablecoin in the future” but did not disclose potential third-party partnerships. Warren wrote that “the lack of transparency regarding the details of Meta’s stablecoin-related plans is deeply troubling.”

Meta pursued a digital currency under the Libra project in 2019 and abandoned the effort after pushback from lawmakers. After passage last year of legislation legalizing stablecoin issuance, Meta has resumed testing third-party stablecoin payments. The May 20 deadline arrives as the Senate prepares to consider the Clarity Act.