Category Archives: Stablecoin

Stablecoins – A New Model of Trust enabled by Technology?

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Part 1 – Programmable Settlement

Summary

The defining innovation of stablecoins is not the technology itself, but the trust architecture they enable. While today’s business architecture will NOT be turned upside down, the stablecoin frame does enable new models for managing legal contracts, systems interaction,  operational governance, all within a new regulatory superstructure.

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Stripe Acquires Privy – Link expands as Does Stripe’s “Gatekeeper” Position

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Stripe’s announcedits acquisition of Privy yesterday, web3 wallet infrastructure platform that enables developers to easily build and integrate secure, self-custodial wallets into their applications with well defined APIs (consistent with everything Stripe does). 

IMHO this signals an acceleration of Stripe’s strategy to dominate the intersection of eCom, wallets, Finance and stablecoin, with a likely product focus on embedding user-friendly stablecoin wallets directly into merchant checkouts and developer platforms. This will greatly expand and “juice” stablecoin adoption in eCom, particularly when combined with LINK. While it COULD present a slight challenge to cards, I don’t see near term impact there (per blog last week). US and EU consumers prefer card, merchants do as well (due to governance and customer support), ROW, micro payments, cross-border, small merchant acquiring/payfacs (and other edge UCs are a different story). 

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Stablecoins: Bank Strategy – Just Another Rail

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Bankers View: Stablecoins, Deposits, and the Future of Payments

Summarizing my 20 odd tweets yesterday. Note that I don’t necessarily agree with the banks’ strategy, but I do understand it. Given that most of the press is focused on how Stablecoins will destroy banking, I thought a banker’s view would be a useful counterbalance.

The buzz around stablecoins continues, often painting a picture of banks demise. As a former banker I thought I’d share my view on the topic and explain the bank strategy (as I see it). While stablecoins present novel tech, the notion that they will supplant established retail banking relationships is a bunch of “hooky”. Big banks aren’t just watching from the sidelines; they are best positioned to integrate this new rail, much like they’ve absorbed countless payment innovations before.

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Could Stripe Drive eCom Stablecoin Adoption? (A: Maybe, but they wouldn’t do it)

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Following up on yesterday’s discussion about the potential for US Banks to issue stablecoins, the fintech world is abuzz after Stripe’s Sessions announcements covering AI and stablecoin. Given Stripe’s massive influence,  any move they make warrants attention. The question on many payment strategy executives’ minds: Is Stripe about to unleash stablecoins to circumvent traditional card rails for consumer payments? While the crypto-evangelists might be shouting “yes!”, a more pragmatic and skeptical view suggests this is highly unlikely, at least for the core retail checkout experience.

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Top US Banks to Issue their own Stablecoin

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Executive Summary

  1. As a former Banker running payments for 2 of the largest US banks I have a perspective on how this will play out. I may be wrong, but it is an informed perspective.
  2. As outlined 2 weeks ago banks in the EU are planning their own stablecoins.
  3. The GENIUS ACT forces stablecoin issuers to obtain bank licenses, thus this morning’s WSJ report that Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Chase are now in the mix is only logical
  4. As outlined in Stablecoin predictions, this will not impact cards as they retain their role in the last mile and banks protect the card model. 
  5. As outlined in Power of Bank Networks, Payments are where the power of banking is unlocked. The major US banks are payment hubs that connect to all networks, from TCH, RTP, Swift, Card, …etc.  These banks are leaders in innovation and in managing operations that consistently clear trillions of dollars PER DAY. 
  6. The stablecoin settlement model is much simpler than an RTP network where each participating party has to register as a sender or receiver of payments. Senders must have settlement funds which restrict their ability to clear payments. In a Stablecoin model, originators only have to have valid stablecoins to transact, and can also create programmable rules around them (see Programmable Money)
  7. The business drivers are remittance, cross border, B2B, and the prospect of growing the global deposit base as international consumers and businesses buy stablecoins. Italy’s finance minister is quoted as saying USD stablecoin adoption (ie dollarization) represents a greater threat to the EU than Tarriffs. 
  8. In my view this is a 3 yr effort. Banks don’t move quickly in isolation, and even more slowly in consortium. I do think that this will first move with commercial use cases and remittances, with banks as stablecoin issuers. Within retail consumer UCs, P2P and Zelle are the area that would be impacted first.  
  9. US Banks should consider the slippery slope of Stablecoin. Once issued, their transfer can’t be restricted, and will operate without friction. Every movement of money becomes instant. This is why I don’t think we will see consumer interfaces within US bank domains in near term. Priority 1 is creating the stablecoin issuing platform and legal structure. Priority 2 is focusing on UCs like cross border and B2B. 

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Programmable Money – Coins and Cards

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Overview

Today we discuss programmable money, a concept that merges smart contract functionality with digital tokens operating on distributed ledger technology (DLT). We trace the historical development from open decentralized finance (DeFi) to the adoption of permissioned systems by leading financial institutions, analyze the technical distinctions between public and private blockchains, and emphasize the necessity of robust governance for scalable deployment. The paper further examines real-world use cases in high-value asset transactions and the growing relevance of programmable money in agentic commerce, highlighting the role of stablecoins and card networks in enabling trusted, logic-driven payments.

There is a payment geek battle of concepts in Agentic commerce. Conceptually, stablecoins and smart contracts provide a better technical architecture for agentic. However, it is my firm belief that these new technologies will be used by existing networks and stakeholders rather than a completely new set of participants and approaches. For example, Visa and Mastercard are likely to remain both the primary off ramp for Stablecoin (ie card merchant acceptance) AND ALSO retain their role in standards, governance, identity, economics and how programmability operates with regulated stakeholders.

I know many of my colleagues will disagree with my views here, that is OK as the dialog will help us all. As such, your comments are welcome.

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Stablecoins: Near-Term Predictions

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12 Page Blog

Key Themes

  • Stablecoin growth is booming in the areas of remittance, cross-border, disbursement, and B2B supply chain. 

  • Card volumes face no threat as they remain the “last mile” of use and an economic model for stable coin issuers. 

  • The STABLE and GENIUS acts are driving significant central bank discussions, with divergent views on response in Europe. 

  • Asia is developing differently, with the effectiveness of Ukraine sanctions and fear of dollarization driving central banks to a CBDC approach.

  • The value of any network corresponds to the combined investment made by all parties around it. Stablecoin is the fastest-growing network and at the core of most FinTech investments.

  • PayPal, and legacy remittance providers are under a substantial near term threat

  • Expect big tech and mobile platforms to support stablecoins in new ways (ex recurring payments and emerging markets). 

  • A small number of low profit Banking segments are also at risk, as Stablecoin issuers become banks and threaten niche payment providers like Cash App, as well as specialists in categories like MSB, NBFCs, ELMI, …etc.

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Stablecoins. Breaking down a momentous set of April announcements

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Impact of Stablecoins on Banks and Central Banks, the Upside for V/MA.

Stablecoins took many amazing leaps in the last 2 weeks. Key developments include

  1. PayPal’s new Stablecoin (PYUSD) earning 3.7% (in PYPL wallet). 
  2. Circle Launches Cross-Border Payment Network:- Circle Payments Network (CPN) – see CPN whitepaper
  3. Paxos and Coinbase, as well as Circle, are pursuing bank charters
  4. Visa to join Paxos and Robinhood in USDG
  5. EU banks are creating a new consortium around stablecoin with the involvement of ING and others.
  6. ECB flags risk of contagion from US crypto push in new policy paper, similarly the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) also published a paper outlining how Crypto and DeFi may destablize finance. 
  7. Italy’s finance minister warns that the attractiveness of US stablecoins poses a bigger risk to Europe than Tariffs.
  8. Regulatory – The STABLE Act has advanced through the House Financial Services Committee, increasing the likelihood of Congress passing legislation to regulate stablecoins (and New Bank Formation Act). Fed Chairman Powell voiced strong support at the Economic Club of Chicago.
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