Bank of America CEO: Interest-Bearing Stablecoins Could Take $6T Out of Bank Deposits

Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan has warned that interest‑bearing stablecoins could draw as much as $6 trillion out of U.S. bank deposits, roughly 30–35% of total commercial bank deposits, if regulation allows them to pay yield similar to bank accounts or money‑market funds.​

What Moynihan actually said

• Moynihan raised this estimate on a recent quarterly earnings call and at investor events, citing U.S. Treasury studies suggesting that a large share of deposits could migrate into yield‑bearing stablecoins and similar products.​

• He emphasized that traditional banks would lose a major, low‑cost funding source if those deposits shifted into tokenized, interest‑earning instruments outside the banking system.​

Why $6T matters for banks

• U.S. commercial bank deposits are in the ballpark of $17–20 trillion, so a $6 trillion outflow would remove about one‑third of the sector’s core funding base used to support loans to households and businesses.​

• Moynihan argued that if deposits leave, banks must either shrink lending or replace them with wholesale funding (from markets or central banks), which is usually more expensive and could push up borrowing costs, especially for small and mid‑sized firms that rely on bank credit.​

How stablecoins fit into this

• The specific concern is interest‑bearing or yield‑bearing stablecoins, which would pay users a return on balances and invest reserves mainly in short‑term government securities, making them functionally similar to money‑market mutual funds rather than bank deposits.​

• Today’s major stablecoins typically hold reserves in cash and short‑term Treasuries, but most do not pay users explicit interest; Moynihan’s warning focuses on what happens if regulation lets issuers turn that into a mainstream, yield‑paying product at large scale.​

Regulatory backdrop in the U.S.

• Moynihan’s comments are landing while Congress and the Senate Banking Committee debate broad crypto‑market and stablecoin bills (including the CLARITY framework and earlier GENIUS‑style proposals) that would, among other things, decide whether and how stablecoin providers can pay interest on idle balances.​

• Recent draft language would restrict or ban yields on stablecoins just for “holding” them, while still allowing rewards tied to activities like payments, remittances, staking, or providing liquidity, which is partly a response to the banking lobby’s $6T deposit‑flight concern.​

How other players view the risk

• Trade groups such as the American Bankers Association and Bank Policy Institute have echoed the worry that large‑scale, yield‑bearing stablecoins could drain trillions from deposits and undermine banks’ role in credit creation.​

• Some other large financial institutions and crypto industry figures counter that regulated stablecoins can coexist with banks and act more like complements or upgraded payment rails rather than full substitutes for insured deposits, especially if yield on idle balances is constrained by law.​