Former CFTC Chairman Timothy Massad said the U.S. is advancing central bank digital currency infrastructure through international programs despite Trump's ban, pointing to New York Fed participation in the BIS's Project Agorá as evidence. Massad, a Harvard Kennedy School research fellow and director of its Digital Assets Policy Project, described a government-backed digital dollar as inevitable at a recent panel discussion.

The gap between Washington's public ban and the New York Fed's actual behavior is widening. Follow the digital dollar story at Web Snack.

How Trump's CBDC Ban Left the New York Fed in a Gray Zone

On January 23, 2025, Trump signed the executive order "Strengthening American Leadership in Digital Financial Technology," directing federal agencies to halt any activity related to developing or promoting CBDCs, domestically or abroad. The order terminated all ongoing CBDC plans across every agency, framing such programs as threats to financial privacy and U.S. sovereignty.

Congress followed with the Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act. The House passed it 219-210 on July 17, 2025. Sponsored by House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, the bill would codify the executive order into law, barring the Federal Reserve from issuing or studying a CBDC without explicit congressional authorization. Attached to the Foreign Intelligence Accountability Act, it now awaits a Senate vote.

Neither the executive order nor the House bill addressed what would happen to U.S. participation in multilateral CBDC programs already running before the order took effect. The New York Federal Reserve had been inside Project Agorá before January 2025, and that involvement appears to have continued.

Project Agorá: The Wholesale Settlement Test Washington Won't Call a CBDC

Project Agorá is coordinated by the Bank for International Settlements, with the New York Federal Reserve working alongside central banks from the UK, eurozone, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, and Switzerland. More than 40 commercial banks are involved. The project tests whether tokenized central bank money and commercial bank deposits can run on a shared programmable platform, specifically to streamline cross-border payments.

The program is wholesale only – institutional transfers between banks, not consumer accounts. U.S. supporters of continued participation argue this distinction is meaningful: wholesale digital settlement is structurally different from the retail digital dollar Trump's order targets. Critics say the underlying technology raises the same policy questions either way.

Massad, speaking at a panel discussion this week, pointed to U.S. involvement in Project Agorá as evidence that CBDC-adjacent work is continuing despite the administration's stated position. He argued that pulling out of such international programs would be difficult given how interconnected global payment systems have become, and described some form of government-backed digital payment infrastructure as sooner or later inevitable.

What the Policy Gap Means for Dollar Dominance and Global Standards

The disconnect between Washington's CBDC ban and the New York Fed's technical participation directly affects U.S. influence in how global digital payment standards get written. As of May 2026, every G20 country except the United States is exploring a CBDC, with 18 of them in advanced stages, according to Atlantic Council data.

China's digital yuan had processed over 3.4 billion transactions worth roughly 16.7 trillion renminbi by December 2025. Cross-border wholesale CBDC projects have more than doubled since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, with 13 such programs now active globally.

Without formal engagement, other countries – China in particular – are in a position to set the technical standards and interoperability protocols for how digital money moves internationally. U.S. presence inside Project Agorá is one of the few remaining ways Washington stays inside that conversation.

Senate Vote and Fed Leadership Will Decide How Long the Status Quo Holds

The Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act faces an uncertain Senate path. The Senate Banking Committee is deliberating S. 1124, a companion bill sponsored by Senator Ted Cruz. House Republicans have also embedded anti-CBDC provisions in the Department of Defense appropriations bill as a parallel track.

Jerome Powell's Federal Reserve chairmanship expired in May 2026. Trump had already nominated a Trump-appointed successor whose approach to wholesale CBDC research – and by extension, New York Fed participation in programs like Project Agorá – remains an open question.

The tension Massad described – a public ban running alongside quiet technical engagement – has no obvious resolution date.

The digital dollar debate is far from settled. Web Snack covers the regulatory and monetary policy moves that actually shape crypto markets.

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