Maine Virtual Currency Kiosk Act

The act covers an automated, unstaffed electronic machine that can facilitate value transfer to a blockchain public key, including transactions to buy virtual currency with fiat currency or sell virtual currency for fiat currency. A “virtual currency kiosk operator” is a person that owns, operates, or manages such a kiosk located in Maine through which virtual currency business activity is offered.

The central regulatory hook is licensing. A kiosk operator must be licensed as a money transmitter under the Maine Money Transmission Modernization Act unless a statutory exemption applies. Operators must also provide the Bureau with the physical locations of kiosks operating in Maine. The act incorporates implementation, administrative, and enforcement provisions from Maine’s money transmitter statutes, giving the state a supervisory path through the existing nonbank money transmission regime.

The law places direct limits on consumer-facing kiosk activity. A virtual currency kiosk operator may not accept or dispense more than $1,000 in a day from or to a customer through the operator’s kiosk. Charges connected to a single kiosk transaction are capped at the greater of $5 or 3% of the U.S. dollar value of the transaction.

At the customer’s option, operators must provide a paper or electronic receipt. The required receipt content includes customer identity, date and time, the operator’s name and license number, fiat and virtual currency amounts, fees charged, transaction hash, public destination address, and exchange rate.

Before entering a kiosk transaction, the operator must make clear, conspicuous, and readable disclosures of material risks generally associated with virtual currency kiosk transactions. The statute specifically references fraud or loss risk and exchange rates charged for the purchase or sale of virtual currency.

The act also creates a refund process for qualifying fraud-related or unfair, deceptive, or abusive transactions. The refund obligation applies to the full amount of transactions made within 90 days of a customer’s first kiosk transaction with that operator, including transaction charges, when the customer satisfies the statute’s reporting and sworn-statement conditions. Any waiver of customer rights under the subchapter is void.

Operators must retain all transaction records for at least three years. The statute lists customer name, address, date of birth and driver’s license number, video or other transaction recordings, and any biometric data collected. This makes the act both a consumer-protection law and a data-handling framework for kiosk operators.

The administrator must adopt rules specifying how virtual currency kiosk operators implement and maintain an information security program. Those rules must be consistent with the federal Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and applicable Federal Trade Commission implementing regulations. The act classifies the rules as routine technical rules under Maine administrative procedure.

LD 1339 was sponsored by Sen. Glenn “Chip” Curry and referred to the Joint Standing Committee on Health Coverage, Insurance and Financial Services. It was enacted as Public Law 2025, chapter 285 and became effective June 12, 2025. The law also required the Superintendent of Consumer Credit Protection to submit, by February 1, 2026, a report with findings and recommendations on protection of kiosk customers from fraudulent activity. Editors should review any later report, rulemaking, or amendments separately from this base profile.