The Future of Stablecoin Payments: A Comprehensive Analysis from Technology to Business

The global financial system is undergoing profound waves of transformation. Traditional payment networks are facing comprehensive challenges from emerging alternatives - stablecoins - due to outdated infrastructure, lengthy settlement periods, and high costs. These digital assets are rapidly innovating the patterns of cross-border value flow, the paradigms of corporate transactions, and the ways individuals access financial services.

In recent years, stablecoins have continued to develop and have become an important underlying infrastructure for global payments. Large fintech companies, payment processors, and sovereign entities are gradually integrating stablecoins into consumer-facing applications and corporate cash flows. At the same time, a series of emerging financial tools, from payment gateways to deposit and withdrawal channels, to programmable yield products, have greatly enhanced the convenience of using stablecoins.

This report provides an in-depth analysis of the stablecoin ecosystem from both technical and business perspectives. It examines the key players shaping this field, the core infrastructure supporting stablecoin transactions, and the dynamic demand driving their applications. Additionally, it explores how stablecoins are giving rise to new financial application scenarios and the challenges they face as they become deeply integrated into the global economic process.

1. Why choose stablecoin payments?

To explore the influence of stablecoins, it is essential to first examine traditional payment solutions. These traditional systems encompass cash, checks, debit cards, credit cards, international wire transfers ( SWIFT ), automated clearing houses ( ACH ), and peer-to-peer payments, among others. Although they have been integrated into daily life, many payment channels, such as ACH and SWIFT, have existed since the 1970s. While they were groundbreaking at the time, today, most of these global payment infrastructures are outdated and highly fragmented. Overall, these payment methods are plagued by high costs, high friction, long processing times, inability to achieve round-the-clock settlement, and complex back-end processes. Additionally, they often require fees for bundling unnecessary extra services such as identity verification, lending, compliance, fraud protection, and bank integration.

Stablecoin payments are effectively addressing these pain points. Compared to traditional payment methods, using blockchain for payment settlement greatly simplifies the payment process, reduces intermediaries, and achieves real-time visibility of fund flows, not only shortening settlement times but also lowering costs.

The main advantages of stablecoin payments can be summarized as follows:

• Real-time settlement: Transactions are completed almost instantly, eliminating delays in traditional banking systems.
• Safe and Reliable: The immutable ledger of blockchain ensures the security and transparency of transactions, providing protection for users.
• Cost Reduction: Removing intermediaries significantly lowers transaction fees, saving costs for users.
• Global Coverage: Decentralized platforms can reach markets underserved by traditional financial services (, including unbanked populations ), achieving financial inclusion.

2. The Landscape of the Stablecoin Payment Industry

The stablecoin payment industry can be divided into four technical stack layers:

( 1. First Layer: Application Layer

The application layer is primarily composed of various payment service providers ) PSP ###, which integrate multiple independent deposit and withdrawal payment institutions into a unified aggregation platform. These platforms provide users with convenient access to stablecoin, offer tools for developers working in the application layer, and provide credit card services for Web3 users.

a. Payment Gateway

A payment gateway is a service that facilitates transactions between buyers and sellers by securely processing payments.

Well-known companies innovating in this field include:

• Stripe: A traditional payment provider that integrates stablecoins such as USDC for global payments.
• MetaMask: does not provide direct fiat currency exchange functionality itself; users can perform deposit and withdrawal operations through integration with its third-party services.
• Helio: 450,000 active wallets and 6,000 merchants. With the Solana Pay plugin, millions of Shopify merchants can settle payments with cryptocurrency and instantly convert USDY to other stablecoins like USDC, EURC, and PYUSD.
• Certain payment applications, certain payment platforms, certain mobile payment applications, certain digital banks and other Web2 payment applications also allow users to make payments using stablecoins, further broadening the application scenarios of stablecoins.

The field of payment gateway providers can be clearly divided into two categories ( with some overlap ).

1( Developer-oriented payment gateway; 2) Consumer-oriented payment gateway. Most payment gateway providers tend to focus more on one type, thus shaping their core products, user experience, and target market.

The developer-oriented payment gateway is designed to serve enterprises, fintech companies, and businesses that need to embed stablecoin infrastructure into their workflows. They typically provide application programming interfaces )API), software development kits (SDK), and developer tools for integration into existing payment systems, enabling features such as automated payments, stablecoin wallets, virtual accounts, and real-time settlement. Some emerging projects focused on providing such developer tools include:

• BVNK: Provides enterprise-grade payment infrastructure for easy integration of stablecoins. BVNK offers API solutions that ensure seamless processes, has a payment platform for cross-border business payments, and allows enterprises to hold and trade multiple stablecoins and fiat currencies through corporate accounts, as well as merchant services that provide the tools needed for businesses to accept customer stablecoin payments. Processing over $10 billion in annualized transaction volume, with a yearly growth rate of 200%, and a valuation of $750 million, clients include emerging regions such as Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia.
• Iron (in beta): Provides an API to seamlessly integrate stablecoin trading into existing businesses. It offers enterprises global deposit and withdrawal channels, stablecoin payment infrastructure, wallets, and virtual accounts, supporting customized payment workflows( including recurring payments, invoicing, or on-demand payments).
• Juicyway: provides a range of corporate payment, payroll, and batch payment APIs, supporting currencies including Nigerian Naira (NGN), Canadian Dollar (CAD), US Dollar (USD), Tether (USDT), and USD Coin (USDC). Primarily targeting the African market, there is no operational data yet.

Consumer-focused payment gateways prioritize users by providing simple and user-friendly interfaces that facilitate stablecoin payments, remittances, and financial services. They typically include mobile wallets, multi-currency support, fiat currency deposit and withdrawal channels, and seamless cross-border transactions. Some well-known projects that focus on providing users with this simple payment experience include:

• Decaf: An on-chain banking platform that enables personal consumption, remittance, and stablecoin transactions in over 184 countries; Decaf collaborates with local channels, including a remittance company, in Latin America to achieve almost zero withdrawal fees, with over 10,000 users in South America and high ratings among certain blockchain developers.
• Meso: A deposit and withdrawal solution integrated directly with merchants, allowing users and businesses to easily convert between fiat currency and stablecoin with minimal friction. Meso also supports purchasing USDC via a mobile payment, simplifying the process for consumers to acquire stablecoins.
• A mobile payment application: The wallet feature of this application utilizes stablecoin technology, but its functionality is integrated into its existing consumer payment application, allowing users to easily send, receive, and use digital dollars without directly interacting with the blockchain infrastructure.

b. U Card

Cryptocurrency cards are payment cards that allow users to spend cryptocurrencies or stablecoins at traditional merchants. These cards are typically integrated with traditional credit card networks like Visa or Mastercard, automatically converting cryptocurrency assets to fiat currency at the point of sale for seamless transactions.

The project includes:

• Reap: Asian card issuer, clients include Infini, Kast, Genosis pay, Redotpay, and more than 40 other companies, selling white label solutions, mainly relying on transaction volume commissions ( such as Kast 85%-Reap 15% ) cooperating with banks in Hong Kong, covering most areas outside of the United States, supporting multi-chain deposits; by July 2024, transaction volume reached $30M.
• Raincards: A card issuer in the Americas, supporting card issuance for multiple companies such as Avalanche, Offramp, takenos, etc., with the main feature of serving users in the US and Latin America. Issued a USDC corporate card to pay for travel expenses, office supplies, and other daily business costs using on-chain assets ( like USDC).
• Fiat24: European card issuer + web3 bank, business model similar to the above two, supports card issuance for companies like ethsign, safepal; Swiss license, mainly serving European + Asian users, does not yet support full-chain transactions, only allows deposits on certain blockchains. Growth is slow with a total of 20,000 users, monthly revenue of $100K-150K.
• Kast: A rapidly growing U Card on a certain blockchain, currently issued over 10,000 cards, with 5-6k monthly active users, a trading volume of $7m in December 2024, and revenue of $200k.
• 1Money: stablecoin ecosystem, recently launched a credit card that supports stablecoins, and provides a software development kit to facilitate L1 and L2 integration, in beta with no data available.

There are many cryptocurrency card providers, which mainly differ in terms of service regions and supported currencies, and they usually provide low-fee services to end users to enhance their enthusiasm for using cryptocurrency cards.

( 2. Second Layer: Payment Processor

As a key layer of the stablecoin technology stack, payment processors are the backbone of payment channels, mainly covering two types: 1. Deposit and withdrawal service providers 2. Stablecoin issuance service providers. They act as a critical intermediary layer in the payment lifecycle, connecting Web3 payments with traditional financial systems.

a. Deposit and Withdrawal Processor

• A payment platform: supports over 80 cryptocurrencies, offers various deposit and withdrawal methods, and token swap services to meet users' diverse cryptocurrency trading needs.
• A payment network: covers over 150 countries, providing deposit and withdrawal services for more than 90 types of crypto assets. The network handles all KYC) identity verification(, AML) anti-money laundering###, and compliance requirements, ensuring the compliance and security of deposit and withdrawal services.
• A hybrid payment gateway: A hybrid payment gateway solution that supports bidirectional exchange and payment between fiat currency and crypto assets, achieving the integration of traditional fiat currency and crypto asset payments.

b. Stablecoin Issuance & Coordination Processors

• Bridge: The core products of Bridge include the Coordination API and the Issuance API. The former helps enterprises integrate various stablecoin payments and exchanges, while the latter supports enterprises in quickly issuing stablecoins. The platform is currently licensed in the United States and Europe and has established important partnerships with the U.S. State Department and the Treasury, demonstrating strong compliance operational capabilities and resource advantages.
• Brale (in beta): Like the Bridge product, it is a regulated stablecoin issuance platform that provides stablecoin coordination and reserve management APIs. It has compliance licenses in various states across the United States, and partner companies are required to undergo KYB( corporate identity verification), while users need to set up an account with Brale for KYC. Brale's clients are more often on-chain OG( such as Etherfuse, Penera, etc., and compared to Bridge, the endorsement from investors and business development is slightly weaker.
• Perena ) in beta (: The Numeraire platform of Perena reduces the issuance threshold of niche stablecoins by encouraging users to provide centralized liquidity in a single pool. Numeraire adopts a "central hub-radiating" model, with USD* as the central reserve asset, serving as the "hub" for the issuance and exchange of stablecoins. This mechanism allows for the efficient minting, redemption, and trading of various stablecoins linked to different assets or jurisdictions, with each stablecoin connected to USD* as similar "spokes". Through this system architecture, Numeraire ensures deep liquidity and enhances capital efficiency, as small stablecoins can be...