Stablecoins Offer Businesses a New Revenue Stream, According to Paxos Labs Co-Founder

The stablecoin market, valued at $300 billion, has evolved beyond its initial purpose of facilitating rapid global transactions. Now, companies are exploring the potential applications of these digital dollars. This shift is driving a new wave of adoption, as the industry transitions from basic infrastructure to practical business use cases, according to Chunda McCain, co-founder of Paxos Labs. In a recent interview with CoinDesk, McCain noted that the initial step of obtaining a stablecoin has given way to a new question: what's next? Paxos Labs, a subsidiary of Paxos, the New York-based digital asset firm behind popular stablecoins like PayPal's PYUSD and the Global Dollar (USDG), has secured $12 million in strategic funding. The investment, led by Blockchain Capital and participated in by Robot Ventures, Maelstrom, and Uniswap, will be used to develop a 'financial utility stack' that enables companies to integrate digital assets into their products through a single integration. The newly launched Amplify Suite offers a range of tools, including Earn, Borrow, and Mint, designed to facilitate the integration of tokens into businesses. For years, the focus of enterprise crypto adoption has been on 'first-touch' capabilities, such as trading, custody, or issuing a stablecoin. However, these initial steps rarely generated significant returns on their own. According to McCain, stablecoins have long been considered 'loss leaders.' The true opportunity lies in how these assets are utilized. One notable example is payments, where merchants typically incur fees of 2-3%. Stablecoin-based payment rails can reduce these costs and even generate yield on balances held on-chain. This can effectively turn a traditional cost into a revenue stream. Some novel use cases are emerging at the intersection of payments and credit. Payment providers can leverage their insight into merchant revenues and cash flow to underwrite loans, argues McCain. This could enable merchants to access financing based on real-time performance while earning yield on incoming payments and settling instantly across borders. Although these models are still in their early stages, the necessary building blocks are starting to come together. Not every company needs to issue its own token to capture these benefits. While some companies, like PayPal, have launched branded tokens to control payments and margins, creating a custom token requires significant investment in liquidity, compliance, and distribution. As McCain noted, 'If you just need the economics, you don't need to build your own.' Many firms can integrate existing stablecoins and still benefit from lower costs and added yield. This shift may lack the hype surrounding big firms launching their own tokens, but it has a tangible impact on business operations. Stablecoins are starting to reshape profit margins, unlock credit, and change how money moves globally, particularly in areas where traditional systems are costly or slow. As McCain stated, 'It might sound boring, but this is the math.'