The global stablecoin market value exceeds US$350 billion, and the integration of payment and reserve asset functions is accelerating

Contributor

Andrew Li , Senior Reporter, Fintech and Blockchain

1. Three core drivers behind the rapid growth

1. Cross-border payment implementation

• Visa has partnered with Circle to integrate USDC into Visa B2B Connect, allowing US and European companies to complete cross-border settlements of $500,000 in 30 seconds.

• Coins.ph, the Philippines’ OFW (overseas foreign workers) remittance platform, has launched a USDT channel, with the handling fee reduced to 1%.

2. On-chain interest rate products

• MakerDAO’s DAI Savings Rate (DSR) is 6.5% annualized, attracting nearly $12 billion in deposits.

• BlackRock's BUIDL fund allows USDC holders to subscribe and redeem 24/7 to earn an annualized return of 4.8% by holding U.S. short-term bonds.

3. Real World Asset (RWA) Linkage

• Ondo Finance launched the USDY stablecoin, which uses U.S. Treasury bond repurchase agreements as reserves, and its scale exceeded US$2 billion in 7 months.

• The size of stablecoin-collateralized Treasury bonds held by on-chain custodian Copper has doubled this year to $9 billion.

2. Payment, Reserve and DeFi: Integration of the Three Major Functions of Stablecoins

JPMorgan Chase reported that stablecoins are becoming "on-chain dollar banks" with money market-style returns and high liquidity, making them both cash substitutes and short-term debt fund attributes.

III. Compliance and Concentration Risk

• Regulatory differentiation : The US stablecoin bill is still to be passed, the EU MiCA has come into effect, and many Asian countries do not yet have a unified framework, and cross-border use is susceptible to policy fluctuations.

• Reserve transparency : USDT disclosure frequency has been changed to monthly, but 15% of reserves are still “other highly liquid assets”.

• Concentration : USDT and USDC account for a high proportion. If either party encounters a black swan event, it will have an impact on the overall stability of DeFi.

4. Technological Evolution: Programmable Stablecoins and On-Chain Settlements

• Programmable payments : Visa is testing conditional release (pay as you go) on the Solana mainnet to enable smart contract payments.

• Off-chain Proof of Assets (PoR 2.0) : Use multi-signature + oracle off-chain audit to push reserve changes in real time and reduce the risk of forgery.

• Layer-2 payment network : Starknet and Optimism are developing low-gas large-value clearing channels to reduce the cost of stablecoin batch settlement.

5. Capital Market Opportunities and Long-term Prospects

BlackRock predicts that the market value of stablecoins may exceed $800 billion in the next three years, of which 50% will be used for RWA pledge and cross-border corporate payments. Andrew Li pointed out: "Whoever can be the first to run through compliance and transparency will have the opportunity to become the next generation of 'on-chain international settlement bank'."