Sponsors (3)
The bill expands merchant choice and competition in card routing to potentially lower costs for merchants and consumers, but it raises technical, compliance, and transition risks and may still leave some exclusive arrangements untouched.
Merchants (especially small businesses) can route credit transactions over any eligible network and cannot be forced into single-network authentication/tokenization, protecting merchant choice and potentially lowering processing costs.
Increases competition among payment networks, which may reduce interchange fees and, over time, lower prices paid by consumers and merchants.
Creates a public list of card networks that pose national security risks, giving regulators and firms clearer guidance to avoid risky foreign-controlled networks.
Network fragmentation from multi-network routing could increase technical complexity and raise fraud and operational risks if networks use incompatible security methods, potentially increasing losses for businesses and consumers.
Designating and publicly listing networks as national-security risks could harm legitimate foreign-owned networks and disrupt existing commercial relationships, imposing transition costs on banks and merchants.
Large card issuers (assets > $100B) will incur compliance costs to change contracts and systems to permit multi-network routing, costs that could be borne by institutions or passed to customers.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Requires the Fed to ban routing restrictions by large card issuers/networks, let merchants choose routing, and publish a national-security risk list of foreign-linked networks.
Introduced January 13, 2026 by Roger Wayne Marshall · Last progress January 13, 2026
Requires the Federal Reserve Board to write rules that increase competition in how credit-card transactions are routed. Within one year the Board must ban covered card issuers and payment card networks from limiting the number of networks that can process a covered credit card’s transactions, ban routing restrictions or penalties that stop merchants from choosing routing, and publish a public list of payment networks that pose national security risks or are owned/operated/sponsored by foreign state entities. The rulemaking excludes 3‑party payment card models, applies to ‘‘covered card issuers’’ (those with assets over $100 billion), must be finalized and take effect 180 days after the Board’s final rule, and includes regular reassessments and updates (biennial network-risk list; Board review every 3 years of the largest networks). Definitions for key terms are added or adapted from existing credit laws.