Bill stops making pennies and lets stores round cash to nickels.

What it does

The bill stops the U.S. Mint from making new pennies for regular use. The Mint can still make pennies for collectors. Businesses and people can round cash payments to the nearest nickel. The Federal Reserve must study how stopping pennies affects poor people. It must also study people without bank accounts.

Who it affects

The U.S. Mint saves money by making fewer coins. Stores and businesses handle less cash. People who use cash may pay more because of rounding rules.

One thing to notice

The rounding rule favors stores over cash users. When a bill is 1 or 2 cents over, people round down. When a bill is 3 or 4 cents over, stores round up.

From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.

Where it stands

3 cosponsors: 2 Democrats, 1 Republicans.

• Apr 30, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
• Apr 30, 2025 — Referred to Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs”
• Aug 7, 2026 — Reported out of committee · Congress.gov: “Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs discharged by Unanimous Consent”
• Aug 7, 2026 — Passed the Senate · Congress.gov: “Passed Senate with an amendment by Unanimous Consent”

Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.

Money around this bill

22 groups reported lobbying about this bill. They filed 34 reports from Sep 2025 to Jun 2026.

Those reports show $15,374,000 in lobbying spending. Each report lists about 8 bills. So that money was not all for this bill.

More groups named this bill than 97% of bills with any report.

Cynthia Lummis, who sponsored the bill, received $558,192 from PACs for the 2026 election.

• American Bankers Association — $5,210,000 in 2 reports
• National Restaurant Association — $1,620,000 in 2 reports
• United Steel Paper & Forestry Rubber Manufacturing Energy — $1,600,000 in 3 reports
• Food Marketplace Inc — $1,384,000 in 2 reports
• Target Corporation — $1,170,000 in 2 reports

Lobbying is legal. These reports show who lobbied about this bill, not what changed.

Words to know

• U.S. Mint — The government agency that makes coins and paper money.
• Federal Reserve — The central bank of the United States that manages money and banking.
• rounding — Changing a price to the nearest whole number, like 5 cents or 10 cents.
• lobbying — Trying to influence lawmakers about a bill. Companies and groups pay people to do this.
• PACs — Groups that collect money and give it to candidates for office.
• sponsored — To sponsor a bill is to introduce it in Congress and put your name on it.