Business
Trump sides with crypto firms in trillion-dollar battle with banks over stablecoin yield
US President Donald Trump boards Air Force One before departing Palm Beach International Airport in West Palm Beach, Florida, on March 1, 2026, on his way back to Washington, DC.
Mandel Ngan | Afp | Getty Images
President Donald Trump has thrown his support behind crypto firms in their high-stakes battle with U.S. banks over whether they can offer interest-like returns on stablecoins.
Trump, in a social media post late Tuesday, ratcheted up pressure on banks to relent on the stablecoin yield issue.
That’s the key point of contention holding up passage in Congress of the Clarity Act, which is a companion bill to the Genius Act approved last year, setting up a framework for regulated stablecoins.
“The Genius Act is being threatened and undermined by the Banks, and that is unacceptable,” Trump said in his post. “They need to make a good deal with the Crypto Industry because that’s what’s in best interest of the American People.”
Coinbase shares surged as much as 13% in early trading Wednesday, while shares of JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America fell less than 1%.
While Trump’s decision to back the crypto industry could sway members of his Republican Party in the GOP-led Congress, it’s unclear whether his support is enough to ensure the bill’s passage. The move also raises fresh questions over potential conflict of interests, as the president and his family have reportedly generated hundreds of millions of dollars in wealth from interests in firms including the crypto platform World Liberty Financial.
The dispute between the industries centers on whether crypto firms like Coinbase can offer yields on stablecoins. While crypto companies see it as a consumer-friendly innovation that will let people earn money on their idle funds, banks have warned that the competing product could siphon trillions of dollars from their industry.
$6.6 trillion threat?
Executives from JPMorgan and Bank of America, the two largest American lenders by assets, have cited a Treasury study that indicated that banks could lose up to $6.6 trillion in deposits if stablecoins offered a yield.
That could destabilize some banks, especially smaller ones, and remove a source of funding for loans to businesses across the country.
Allowing the less-regulated crypto industry to behave like quasi-banks could heighten systemic risk, banks argue. Crypto firms say that the risks are contained and that stablecoins backed by Treasuries will boost demand for U.S. debt.
“It can’t be, you have these people doing one thing without any regulation, and these people doing another,” JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon told CNBC’s Leslie Picker on Monday. “If you do that, the public will pay. It will get bad.”
In recent months, the president has hosted a series of White House meetings between the two sides in hopes of brokering a deal, but the banks haven’t relented, according to people with knowledge of the gatherings.
Now, he is explicitly putting his weight behind crypto.
“Americans should earn money on their money,” Trump said in the post. “This industry cannot be taken from the People of America when it is so close to becoming truly successful.”
‘Full of s–t’
That phrasing is similar to language that Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong has used in interviews. Coinbase is the largest U.S. crypto platform and provides yield to members through what critics in the banking industry call a “loophole” in current regulations.
Armstrong, seen by banks as their main adversary in this dispute, met with Trump at the White House shortly before the president’s social media post Tuesday, according to a person with knowledge of the meeting. That detail was reported earlier by Politico.
Both banks and crypto firms have reasons to support passage of the Clarity Act, but it’s unclear whether that will happen, given the disagreement. Earlier this year, Trump attempted to pressure banks to cap credit card interest rates, but the industry had enough support among both Republicans and Democrats to ward off that threat.
Tensions between Armstrong and banking CEOs have climbed since the Coinbase CEO publicly called out banks for their opposition to stablecoin yields.
In January, Dimon reportedly told Armstrong he was “full of s–t” during a chance interaction at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Business
Ministers urged to stick to ticket tout ban amid fears of delay
The Government has been urged to stick to its pledge to ban ticket touting amid concerns the policy will be left out of next month’s King’s Speech.
In November, the Government announced that new rules making it illegal to resell tickets for live events for profit would end the “industrial-scale” touting that has caused misery for millions of fans.
Ministers confirmed plans to make it illegal for tickets to concerts, theatre, comedy, sport and other live events to be resold for more than their original cost.
The Labour manifesto promised stronger protections to stop consumers being scammed or priced out of events by touts, who frequently use bots to buy tickets in bulk the moment they go on sale, which they can then sell on for huge mark-ups on secondary ticketing websites.
The proposed rules make it illegal for tickets to be sold at a price above the face value – defined as the original price plus unavoidable fees including service charges.
Service fees will be capped to prevent the price limit being undermined by platforms, which will have a legal duty to monitor and enforce compliance, and individuals will be banned from reselling more tickets than they were entitled to buy in the initial sale.
A host of globally renowned artists have backed the plan, including Radiohead, Dua Lipa and Coldplay.
Following a report in the Guardian that the minister responsible for the policy, Ian Murray, had told music industry groups not to worry if the measure was not part of the King’s Speech on May 13, the Government said it required new primary legislation that it was working to deliver at the earliest opportunity.
A Government spokeswoman said: “Ticket touts are a blight on the live events industry, causing misery for millions of fans.
“We set out decisive plans last year to stamp out touting once and for all, and we are committed to delivering on these for the benefit of fans and industry.”
The music industry and Which? raised concerns about the suggestion of any delay, as sites appeared to show touts selling tickets for the Radio 1 Big Weekend in Sunderland well above the two-ticket limit for buyers and at vastly inflated prices.
Annabella Coldrick, chief executive of the Music Managers Forum, said: “2026 was supposed to mark this Government moving ‘from announcements to action’ but we have little evidence of this to date.
“A ban on ticket touting was one of only two music-related commitments in the Labour manifesto, alongside fixing EU touring.
“These are widely supported, pro-growth measures that will deliver tangible benefits to the British public. However, if ticket resale legislation is not presented in the King’s Speech, it will have the opposite effect and continue to cost those constituents hundreds of millions of pounds a year.
“This Government needs to stand by its promises and get it done.”
Adam Webb, campaign manager at FanFair Alliance, said: “The Government has a big decision to make: will they ‘put fans first’ or not?
“Last November, ministers committed to ‘bold new measures’ to ban online ticket touting and support consumers.
“Enacting these measures should be a no-brainer but, if legislation is not presented in the upcoming King’s Speech, the cycle of industrial-scale exploitation will continue.”
Lisa Webb, consumer law expert at Which?, said: “The Government has promised to put fans first but, if this legislation is not included in the King’s Speech, the only ones celebrating will be the rip-off secondary ticketing websites and online touts.”
Business
Warner Bros shareholders approve Paramount’s $111bn takeover
The approval came as Donald Trump is to attend a dinner with billionaire Paramount backers the Ellisons.
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France Ends Airport Transit Visa Requirement for Indian Travellers | Business – The Times of India
France has lifted the airport transit visa requirement for Indian nationals with effect from April 10, the French Embassy in India announced on Thursday.Indian nationals holding ordinary passports are no longer required to obtain an airport transit visa when passing through the international zone of airports located on French territory during a layover en route to a third country.The change follows a decree amending the 2010 regulations on documents and visas required for the entry of foreigners into French territory. The decree was adopted and published in the French Official Gazette (Journal Officiel) on April 9, 2026.MEA welcomes the moveThe Ministry of External Affairs welcomed the announcement.“We welcome the announcement on the operationalisation of visa-free transit for Indian nationals transiting through French airports,” MEA Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said.He recalled that the removal of the transit visa requirement for Indian passport holders was agreed between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President Emmanuel Macron during their meeting in Mumbai in February this year.“The government of France has now operationalized this agreement,” Jaiswal added.Who benefitsThe measure applies to Indian nationals transiting through mainland France exclusively by air, remaining in the international airport zone without entering French territory.President Macron had announced during his visit to India in February that measures would be taken to ease travel for Indian nationals via France.
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What do you think is the main advantage of this visa policy change?
The updated procedures have been reflected on the France-Visas platform.
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