Stablecoin regulation in Singapore: MAS rules and the pending law

Singapore regulates stablecoins today through the Payment Services Act 2019, and a dedicated regime is still pending. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) finalised a single-currency stablecoin framework on August 15, 2023, but it is policy, not statute. A consultation on amendments that would give it legal force closed on October 16, 2026.

That gap is what a payments team has to plan around, and what a stablecoin is covers the basics. This post separates what binds a business paying or collecting in Singapore now from what is only proposed, using MAS's own texts where they were available to us and law-firm summaries of the draft where they were not. Rules for the UK and Hong Kong sit in our three-country stablecoin roundup and in the Hong Kong issuer regime post, so this one stays on Singapore.

Where does stablecoin regulation in Singapore stand today?

Five texts matter, and only some of them are law: four are in force or final, and the fifth is a draft. The table is dated November 1, 2026, the day the sources below were read.

Singapore stablecoin instruments and their status as of November 1, 2026.

On the last row, we found no MAS response to the consultation and no bill before Parliament on the day of writing, and the MAS consultation page names no date for passage.

What the 2023 MAS framework requires of issuers

The framework covers single-currency stablecoins pegged to the Singapore dollar or to a G10 currency and issued in Singapore. MAS's August 15, 2023 release sets four groups of requirements:

• Value stability: reserve assets must meet rules on composition and valuation, plus custody and audit.

• Capital: issuers hold minimum base capital and liquid assets, so that a failing issuer can wind down in order.

• Redemption: issuers return par value to holders within five business days of a request.

• Disclosure: issuers publish the stabilising mechanism, holder rights and the audit results of the reserves.

Only an issuer that meets all of them can apply for its coin to be recognised as a "MAS-regulated stablecoin." For anyone else, the same page tells users to make their own judgement about stablecoins outside the framework.

Singapore does not ban stablecoins outside the framework. It reserves a name for the ones that pass.

What the September 2026 draft law would change

MAS published Consultation Paper P015-2026 on September 1, 2026, with draft amendments to the PSA. The MAS media release confirms the headline proposals: licensed issuers only could describe themselves as MAS-regulated, coins issued jointly by a Singapore and a foreign issuer could qualify, MAS would recognise a limited number of foreign-regulated stablecoins mainly for cross-border wholesale use, and issuers would be barred from paying interest on MAS-regulated stablecoins. Stablecoins outside the framework would be treated as DPTs.

MAS's PDFs were not available to us on this date, so the draft text itself (Annex C of the consultation) was not read. The next details come from Gibson Dunn's summary of it, and the full paper should be checked before any of them goes into a contract:

• A standalone stablecoin issuance licence, separate from the existing payment licence classes. Holding out as MAS-regulated without it would attract criminal penalties.

• Reserves at least equal to the par value of coins in circulation, held in segregated trust accounts, with redemption at par within timeframes MAS will set later in subsidiary legislation.

• A new power to designate a stablecoin as systemic, wherever it is issued. MAS could direct Singapore DPT providers to stop offering a designated coin and delist it.

• Foreign recognition as "MAS-recognised," case by case, only where the home regime is substantively equivalent and supervisors cooperate.

• An interest ban that does not cover revenue-sharing arrangements with third parties.

• For DPT providers offering non-MAS coins to retail customers: reserve disclosure, risk warnings and no use of the word "stablecoin" in retail marketing, with a transition period under consultation.

The systemic-designation power matters most to a payments company, because it reaches the provider's product list. A coin you settle in could be delisted by Singapore-licensed counterparties on MAS's direction.

How USDC and USDT are treated in Singapore today

USDC and USDT are issued outside Singapore, so neither is inside the MAS framework as it stands. Under the PSA, a stablecoin that is not MAS-regulated stays a digital payment token. Gibson Dunn's summary of the draft says such coins remain lawful and continue to be regulated as DPTs, with the licensing falling on the service providers that exchange, transfer or hold them.

The licence class depends on the activity. A provider that exchanges, transfers or holds digital payment tokens for customers in Singapore sits under the PSA's DPT services. A provider based in Singapore that serves only customers abroad sits under Part 9 of the FSMA as a digital token service provider. Which class applies to a given counterparty is for MAS and Singapore counsel to say.

Three consequences follow for a business with Singapore counterparties.

1. A Singapore exchange, custodian or transfer service handling these coins needs a licence under the PSA, and it sits under MAS Notice PSN02 for anti-money-laundering and counter-terrorist-financing controls.

2. A token service run from Singapore for customers only abroad needs a licence under Part 9 of the FSMA since June 30, 2025. Per Allen & Gledhill's summary, MAS has set the bar high for licensing and will generally not issue one.

3. Counterparty information travels with the transfer. The global rules behind that are in our guide to the travel rule, and the controls a payments business runs are in our post on stablecoin AML compliance.

What Lumx does at this point: every Lumx customer goes through KYC (know your customer, the verification of an individual) or KYB (know your business, the verification of a company and its owners) before transacting, and a business customer also supplies regulated-activity information and the corresponding licence when it carries out regulated activities. A company that holds, issues or safeguards stablecoins or wallets falls in the docs' high-risk list, which is allowed with disclosure and Enhanced Due Diligence rather than refused. Singapore is in the Supported tier, which means standard KYC/KYB.

Who needs what under Singapore's stablecoin rules?

The regimes attach to roles, not to the coin alone. The table sorts the roles as of November 1, 2026, from the sources in the methodology section.

Singapore stablecoin obligations by role: current rules against the draft amendments.

The last row is our reading of those sources; Singapore counsel confirms it for a specific activity.

What Lumx does at this point: a Lumx customer pays from its own wallet to registered destinations and declares the relationship to each payee, for example a supplier. Lumx's nested-payments rule requires that every transaction belongs to an onboarded customer acting for itself with its own funds, which keeps the counterparty visible to screening and monitoring.

Planning a Singapore flow while the law is pending

<!-- OPERATOR PARAGRAPH --> I would not build a Singapore flow that depends on a coin carrying the MAS-regulated label, because the label cannot exist until the amendments pass and a licence is granted. I keep the issuer choice swappable and settle the legal leg of the payment through a regulated bank or licensed counterparty on the receiving side. For a jurisdiction with a finished framework and no statute, I would weigh the counterparty's licence above the coin's name.

Two dates are worth tracking from here, both on the MAS consultation page. The consultation closed on October 16, 2026, so the first is the publication of MAS's response to it. The other is the follow-up consultation on subsidiary legislation, which would carry the redemption timeframes and the reserve composition details. Until then, the practical test for a payment to a Singapore company is the same one a bank applies: who is the counterparty, what do they do, and which licence covers it.

The payout side of the region is in paying contractors in Asia, Singapore's hub role in this news item and Asian regulatory milestones.

When a stablecoin payment to Singapore is the wrong tool

A stablecoin leg is the wrong choice in four cases, and we would say so to a client:

• The counterparty is a token service business that cannot show a licence. Under the PSA and FSMA regimes above, the licence is the thing a compliance team asks for, and a payment into an unlicensed provider moves the problem to you.

• The paper trail needs a "MAS-regulated stablecoin" and your counterparty's contract says so. That term describes no coin yet, so the clause cannot be performed.

• The product sold to retail users is marketed as a "stablecoin" product. The draft would restrict that word for non-MAS coins, and the wording risk is yours before it is the provider's.

• The counterparty needs Singapore-dollar settlement on a local rail. Lumx's coverage page does not show one for Singapore, so the leg would have to run as USD by SWIFT or as stablecoin to a wallet, which that counterparty may not accept.

What Singapore counterparties look like on Lumx

Lumx is stablecoin payments infrastructure for businesses that move money between Latin America and the rest of the world: one API to collect, hold, convert, and pay out in BRL, MXN, COP, USD, EUR, and GBP or in USDC and USDT, over local rails such as PIX, SPEI, PSE, Bre-B, ACH, FEDWIRE, SEPA, and Faster Payments, with SWIFT and on-behalf-of payments and collections (POBO and COBO) in USD, EUR, and GBP, plus named virtual accounts, custodial wallets, and KYB/KYC built in.

For a Singapore counterparty, the steps are specific. A Singapore company is onboarded as a customer under the Supported tier: Lumx collects company formation documents, proof of address, and identity documents for the representative, each beneficial owner and each shareholder above 25%. If compliance needs a corrected document, the customer moves to an RFI (request for information, a compliance hold that asks for a document before work continues), and the customer.rfi webhook says which.

On the payment itself, Lumx's docs name USDC and USDT, and a transfer can move stablecoin to or from an external wallet address. In plain terms, Lumx reaches Singapore through USD by SWIFT or through stablecoin to an external wallet, and it does not claim an SGD rail. USD can leave through SWIFT, with a 3:00 PM ET cut-off and a 1 to 5 business day settlement window that depends on intermediary banks, and Lumx tracks each SWIFT payout with UETR and MT103 confirmations. Every on-ramp and off-ramp carries a purpose field that banking partners use for AML screening, so a mismatch can hold a payment or trigger an RFI.

Lumx has no MAS license. It onboards Singapore customers by reverse solicitation and does not market or prospect in Singapore. A Supported country means Lumx will onboard the customer, not that a local payment rail exists there. Rails by country are on the coverage page, and the list of jurisdictions is on supported countries. For the product side, see Global Payments, and for the roles in the chain, what a VASP is (virtual asset service provider, the FATF term).

Methodology and sources

We read the texts below on November 1, 2026. MAS's PDFs were not available to us on this date, so the details of the draft law come from Gibson Dunn's summary of Annex C and are flagged as such in the post.

• MAS media release, "MAS Consults on Legislative Amendments to Implement Stablecoin Regulatory Framework", September 1, 2026.

• MAS Consultation Paper P015-2026 page, published September 1, 2026, closed October 16, 2026. The page was read; the paper and Annex C were not.

• MAS media release, "MAS Finalises Stablecoin Regulatory Framework", August 15, 2023.

• MAS Notice PSN02, last revised June 30, 2025, effective July 1, 2025. The page was read; the PDF was not, so the notice is cited by name and date only.

• Gibson Dunn, "Singapore Publishes Draft Legislation to Implement Its Stablecoin Framework": source for licence class, penalties, systemic designation, foreign recognition and the DPT provider proposals.

• Allen & Gledhill, FSMA Part 9 digital token service providers: source for the June 30, 2025 start and for MAS's stance on issuing licences.

• Lumx docs read the same day: Coverage, Supported countries, Identity Verification, Request for Information, Wallets, Transactions, Nested Payments, Prohibited business activities and Payment rail cut-off times, on docs.lumx.io.

Verified on November 1, 2026. Operational context, not legal, tax, or investment advice. MAS Consultation Paper P015-2026 checked against mas.gov.sg on November 1, 2026. MAS "MAS Finalises Stablecoin Regulatory Framework" (August 15, 2023) checked against mas.gov.sg on November 1, 2026. MAS Notice PSN02 (last revised June 30, 2025) checked against mas.gov.sg on November 1, 2026.

Cover photo: Donald Merrill on Unsplash.