stablecoin

According to CoinTelegraph, experts warn that the proposed yield restrictions on stablecoins in the U.S. Cryptocurrency Structure Bill (CLARITY Act) may drive demand for offshore and synthetic dollar products, as investors seek to earn yields outside of regulated markets.It is understood that under the already effective GENIUS Act framework, payment stablecoins like USDC must be fully backed by cash or short-term U.S. Treasury securities and cannot pay interest directly, being regarded as "digital cash." Colin Butler, head of the Mega Matrix market, stated that prohibiting compliant stablecoins from offering yields to holders does not protect the U.S. financial system; rather, it marginalizes regulatory agencies and accelerates the migration of capital beyond regulatory boundaries. Currently, the digital yuan has interest-bearing capabilities, and Singapore, Switzerland, and the UAE are advancing frameworks for interest-bearing digital assets. If the U.S. prohibits compliant dollar stablecoin yields, it may weaken global competitiveness.

According to CoinDesk, a recent report by McKinsey and Artemis Analytics states that last year, stablecoins transferred over $35 trillion in funds on the blockchain, but only about 1% of that was used for real-world payments.Their analysis estimates that only $380 billion of the activity reflects actual payments, such as payments to suppliers, remittances, or payroll.This represents a tiny fraction of the total global payments, approximately 0.02% of the total global payments, while McKinsey estimates that the total global payments exceed $20 trillion annually.

Liquid Capital (formerly LD Capital) founder Yi Lihua forwarded a message (from BlackRock's 2026 thematic outlook report) pointing out that Ethereum is expected to be a significant beneficiary of asset tokenization, with approximately 65% of tokenized assets currently deployed on the Ethereum network.Yi Lihua stated: "The biggest beneficiaries of the globalization of stablecoins and financial on-chain are ETH, which also represent the largest practical application opportunities in crypto. In the short term, bottom fluctuations are a normal process. Recently, what I have been working hard on every day is to buy more ETH on dips and actively participate in various ETH capital platforms to assist them in expanding capital to increase their ETH holdings. Only through practical efforts and going long can we achieve significant results."

According to official news, the Binance Wallet App and the web version now support direct trading of Meme coins using stablecoins. In any trading interface, you can switch the payment currency and directly purchase MEME tokens with stablecoins. The currently supported stablecoins include USDT, USDC, U, and USD1.

According to market news, the American Bankers Association has listed "preventing stablecoins from generating yields" as its top lobbying goal for 2026. The association believes that interest-bearing stablecoins could become an alternative to bank deposits, potentially leading to the outflow of trillions of dollars from the traditional banking system, thereby weakening banks' lending capabilities and jeopardizing their core role in the financial system.In response, Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire countered at the Davos Forum that concerns about stablecoin yields affecting bank deposits are "completely absurd," pointing out that yields can enhance user stickiness and that in the future, stablecoins will become a necessary payment system for AI agents to conduct large-scale transactions. Opponents argue that this move aims to protect bank interests, restrict financial technology innovation, and put the dollar at a disadvantage in the competition with China's digital yuan.

The American Bankers Association (ABA) has stated that it will prioritize "curbing interest/yield/reward on payment stablecoins" as a key policy issue in 2026, reflecting concerns about stablecoins becoming alternatives to bank deposits.Bank of America CEO Moynihan warned earlier this month that if the U.S. Congress does not limit interest-bearing stablecoins, up to $6 trillion in deposits could shift away from banks, a figure that represents about 30% to 35% of total deposits in U.S. commercial banks.Moynihan noted that the structure of stablecoins is similar to that of money market mutual funds, which hold reserves in short-term instruments (such as U.S. Treasury securities) rather than being used for bank loans like traditional banks. In this model, funds are detached from the traditional banking system, leading to a shrinking deposit base that banks rely on to support loans to households and businesses.

S&P Global Ratings stated that stablecoins could account for 20% of bank deposits in certain emerging market countries. The report analyzed the adoption of foreign currency stablecoins (primarily dollar-pegged assets) in 45 emerging market countries.The report noted that the adoption of stablecoins will be driven by three main factors: local currency depreciation pressure, demand for cross-border remittances, and the widespread use of digital assets. In order of importance, the motivations for adoption include wealth protection, remittances and international trade, as well as enthusiasm for digital assets. S&P Global believes that countries with high inflation show the greatest potential for stablecoin adoption. In the most aggressive scenario, stablecoins could reach 10-20% of bank deposits in the top 15 countries with the strongest demand for wealth preservation, particularly in countries where local currency purchasing power is declining.In January of this year, blockchain analytics firm Artemis reported that, geographically, India and Argentina are true global outliers, with USDC accounting for 47.4% and 46.6% of stablecoin usage in these two countries, respectively.

According to the official announcement from USD.AI, USD.AI has approved a maximum asset-backed, non-recourse debt limit of $500 million to the Australian AI computing provider Sharon AI, financing GPU deployments through an on-chain credit system with stablecoin liquidity; the first tranche of approximately $65 million is expected to be utilized as early as possible.

PwC's "2026 Global Crypto Regulation Report" points out that the adoption of crypto assets by institutions has crossed an "irreversible point," making it difficult to retract the related processes.The report states that the current focus of discussion is no longer whether institutions should use crypto assets, but rather how to integrate them into the existing financial system. Crypto assets are shifting from being primarily about trading and speculation to being deeply embedded in core financial scenarios such as payments, settlements, cash management, and balance sheet management, with the production-level application of stablecoins being particularly crucial. PwC notes that stablecoins and tokenized cash are widely used by banks, asset management firms, and payment companies for internal transfers, cross-border payments, and corporate funding operations, with crypto technology gradually becoming the "behind-the-scenes financial infrastructure," often unnoticed by end users.The report believes that once crypto systems are embedded in an institution's core business processes, the path to adoption will be difficult to reverse. This view is echoed by several market participants, including Circle, the issuer of USDC.

Blockchain analysis company Elliptic's latest report shows that the ruble stablecoin A7A5 has surpassed $10 billion in on-chain transaction volume since its launch in 2025.This stablecoin is primarily launched by the Russian company A7 LLC, aimed at helping Russian businesses evade Western sanctions. The main function of A7A5 is to serve as a bridge asset between the ruble and USDT, with a total trading volume reaching $17.3 billion, the vast majority of which occurs on exchanges like Grinex in Kyrgyzstan.Despite the significant trading volume, its growth has been notably constrained since August 2025, when countries like the United States imposed sanctions on A7A5. New token issuance has essentially stalled since the end of July, with daily trading volumes dropping from a peak of $1.5 billion to around $500 million. Major DEXs like Uniswap have listed it on their token blacklist, while the liquidity injection of USDT on its own DEX has significantly decreased. Sanctions have led users to face the risk of account freezes when transferring USDT from A7A5 to mainstream exchanges, increasingly isolating it from the broader crypto ecosystem.

According to Cointelegraph, Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire stated that stablecoins are the only systems capable of supporting billions of AI agents in large-scale transactions.

Layer-1 blockchain protocol Saga has urgently paused its Ethereum-compatible Saga EVM chainlet after experiencing an attack that resulted in a loss of approximately $7 million. The attack led to unauthorized funds being cross-chain transferred and exchanged for ETH, causing its dollar-pegged stablecoin, Saga Dollar, to de-peg, with the price dropping to as low as $0.75. The Saga team stated that the chain was paused at block height 6,593,800.Preliminary investigations indicate that the incident involved a series of contract deployments, cross-chain operations, and liquidity withdrawals, but there was no consensus failure, validator compromise, or private key leakage; the overall structure of the Saga mainnet remains secure. The impact was not limited to Saga Dollar; its stablecoins Colt and Mustang were also affected. The team has identified the addresses involved in the attack and is working with exchanges and cross-chain bridges to blacklist these addresses. The chain will remain paused until a complete security audit and post-mortem analysis are published.On-chain data shows that Saga's TVL plummeted from approximately $37 million to $16 million within 24 hours, a decrease of about 55%. Some security researchers speculate that the attack may be related to the "infinite minting" of stablecoins using cross-chain mechanisms, while others believe that the possibility of private key leakage cannot be ruled out, but the officials have not yet confirmed the specific attack vector.

The Argentina-based fintech company Pomelo has completed a $55 million Series C funding round, led by Kaszek and Insight Partners, aimed at deepening its presence in the Latin American market and expanding its global business.The funds will be used to expand its credit card payment processing operations in Mexico and Brazil, and to launch a global credit card settled in the stablecoin USDC. Pomelo also plans to develop a real-time and smart agent payment system that can operate across borders, serving traditional banks and large international clients, with current partners including Visa, Mastercard, Binance, and Western Union.

According to River's official statement, TRON founder and HTX advisor Justin Sun has made a strategic investment of $8 million in River to promote the integration and deployment of River's chain-abstract stablecoin infrastructure on TRON.The stablecoin satUSD launched by River can be minted 1:1 with USDT, USDD, or USD, and supports cross-chain assets as collateral. It is planned to be used for liquidity mining and lending on platforms such as SUN.io and DeFi JUST, with the first entry being the native sTRX staking rewards.

During the World Economic Forum held in Davos, Switzerland, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong engaged in a heated debate with French central bank governor François Villeroy de Galhau on issues such as whether stablecoins should pay yields to holders and the monetary attributes of Bitcoin.Armstrong stated that allowing stablecoins to provide yields to users would help enhance consumer returns and international competitiveness, and pointed out that if U.S. regulated stablecoins were banned from paying yields, it might actually benefit offshore products. Villeroy de Galhau took the opposing stance, arguing that private stablecoins with yield attributes could pose systemic risks to the traditional banking system and financial stability, and clearly stated that the digital euro should not use yields as a competitive tool, with its core objective being to maintain the stability of the financial system.On U.S. legislative issues, Armstrong emphasized that the CLARITY Act is not stalled but is in the negotiation phase, explaining that Coinbase's recent withdrawal of support was to oppose the banking industry's lobbying to restrict competition in the crypto sector. Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse pointed out that the so-called "level playing field" should apply in both directions, with both crypto companies and banks adhering to equivalent regulatory standards.When the discussion turned to Bitcoin, Armstrong introduced the concept of a "Bitcoin standard," suggesting it could serve as a long-term option against fiat currency devaluation. Villeroy opposed this, emphasizing that monetary policy falls under national sovereignty and warning that private currencies could undermine sovereignty. Armstrong responded by stating that Bitcoin does not have a single issuer and is even more decentralized than the central banking system.