U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent: Crypto Technology Will Become a Key Payment Channel
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated in multiple public speeches and during a Senate appropriations committee meeting that crypto assets and blockchain "are not a threat to the U.S. dollar". Instead, technologies like stablecoins are creating an "internet-native payment channel" for the dollar, which will become "a very important payment track" in the future. He emphasized that the U.S. must maintain and strengthen its global leadership in this area. Bessent pointed out that digital assets like stablecoins provide the dollar with a fast, low-friction, globally scalable payment infrastructure that can operate under compliance regulations and the U.S. anti-money laundering framework, with the potential to support multi-trillion-dollar markets, expand demand for U.S. Treasury bonds, and further solidify the dollar's status as the reserve currency.
Source: Public Information
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Bessent clearly positions "crypto as a payment track" rather than a "parallel currency", effectively setting the tone for the official narrative: crypto technology is seen as an extension layer of the dollar system, not a replacement layer. In his words, stablecoins are defined as the "internet-native payment infrastructure for the dollar", with their value lying in expanding the use of the dollar from traditional banks and card organizations to a 24/7, cross-border, low-cost on-chain network, while re-linking liquidity back to the U.S. financial system through assets fully backed by U.S. Treasury bonds and cash deposits.
This reflects a reassessment of the global payment and currency competition landscape. Over the past two decades, the dollar's advantage has partly relied on SWIFT, card networks, and dollar clearinghouses, but now in emerging markets and the Web3 ecosystem, these infrastructures are being rapidly replaced by stablecoins and on-chain payments. Bessent's statement acknowledges this migration while clearly stating that the U.S. should "continue to lead on the new track" rather than trying to prevent its emergence. This is also why the Treasury is promoting legislation like the Clarity Act and GENIUS Act to provide clear licensing and regulatory frameworks for payment stablecoins, while also emphasizing the prohibition of interest payments on stablecoins to prevent them from evolving into "bank-like deposits"—the payment function is welcomed, while bank-like functions are strictly controlled within the existing system.
From a long-term structural perspective, incorporating crypto technology into the narrative of "official payment tracks" will accelerate differentiation within the industry: one category will be integrated into compliance frameworks, centered around dollar stablecoins, on-chain settlements, and compliant wallets, directly serving trade, cross-border remittances, and financial market infrastructure; the other category will maintain decentralization, censorship resistance, and anonymity as a "gray track", which is closer to the opposite of financial security and capital controls from a regulatory perspective. By defining crypto as an "important payment track", Bessent is also vying for policy resources and legal certainty for the former path, re-linking technological dividends with dollar hegemony.