Today, Open Standard launched Open USD (OUSD). Visa, Mastercard, Google, and 140+ of the world’s largest financial institutions and payment companies are a part of the Open Standard, with Fireblocks as a key infrastructure partner. This is an inflection point: digital assets are becoming a crucial part of how value moves around the world, underpinning and transforming business critical payment flows. Learn more in the announcement blog.
The time to move is now
The window to capitalize on the stablecoin opportunity is short. The why and how are clear, and organizations that look to leapfrog ahead are moving quickly to free capital and create new efficiencies:
- Issuing banks can collapse collateral requirements that is currently locked in reserve for card settlement.
- Acquiring banks and PSPs get same-day clearing, freeing up working capital and enabling faster merchant payouts.
- Cross-border treasury movement gets faster and cheaper without the correspondent banking chain.
We are already seeing adoption, with quarterly stablecoin volume across key use cases within Fireblocks’ payment customers:
- $76B for B2B payments and AP/AR: businesses converting fiat to stablecoins to pay vendors and providers with stablecoins instead of wires
- $19B in merchant settlement: settling directly with merchants using stablecoins instead of card rails
- $13B in stablecoin payouts: direct payouts to creators, gig workers, and contractors
- And finally, $2B in issuer/acquirer settlement: settling between issuers and acquirers using stablecoins instead of correspondent banking.
The infrastructure needs are clear
Fireblocks is powering over 100 banks and 300 payment organizations that are using stablecoin to grow and create capital efficiencies. We have seen where the friction shows up as organizations get started, and know what’s needed:
- A strong foundation for pay-ins, pay-outs, and stablecoin accounts. Wallets and orchestration need to be built for the intricacies stablecoin-based flows while integrating into your existing business.
- Blockchain agnostic. Stablecoins, will live on several blockchains. Your infrastructure needs to support all blockchains and digital currencies to align to your use cases.
- Institutional-grade security and compliance. Travel rule, sanctions screening, and KYC need to be composable by workflow and transaction direction, backed by institutional-grade security that protects your funds.
- Seamless integration into existing operations. Successful stablecoin implementations tie into your existing systems and integrations.
Why Fireblocks
We’ve been powering the financial ecosystem as it adopted stablecoin use cases at every stage, with Western Union, BNP Paribas, BNY Mellon, MoneyGram, Checkout.com, Worldpay and others standardizing on Fireblocks. They all chose Fireblocks for the same reasons: they needed infrastructure that works across any blockchain, meets the security bar of institutional finance, and makes compliance controls programmable by workflow across jurisdctions.
Take Moneygram: they initially started by using digital assets for their internal treasury, then moved to stablecoin issuance, and now operate treasury, accounts receivable, and consumer wallets leveraging Fireblocks. The infrastructure decision is the first, and most strategic part of your digital asset journey.
Now is the time to turn your stablecoin strategy into production-ready solutions. Let’s talk about how Fireblocks can partner with you today.
