Visa has announced an expansion of its stablecoin initiative by integrating five new blockchains into its network, underscoring its commitment to a multichain approach in the global payments landscape. The company's stablecoin settlement pilot program has now grown to encompass nine networks and boasts an annualized transaction volume of $7 billion, representing a 50% increase from the previous quarter. This program enables issuers and acquirers to settle transactions using stablecoins, bypassing traditional banking channels. The newly added blockchains - including Coinbase's Base, Polygon, Canton Network, Circle's Arc, and Stripe-backed Tempo - join the existing integrations with Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche, and Stellar.
As stablecoins gain traction as a means of cross-border money movement, Visa's strategic move is designed to capitalize on this trend. By facilitating near real-time transactions through blockchain-based currencies, partners can avoid the delays associated with traditional banking systems.
The expansion of Visa's stablecoin settlement pilot program to multiple networks aims to provide partners with access to diverse liquidity pools without added complexity. According to Rubail Birwadker, Visa's global head of growth products and strategic partnerships, 'Our partners operate in a multichain environment and expect their options to align with this reality. By expanding our stablecoin settlement pilot program to more blockchains, our partners can select the networks that best suit their needs while relying on Visa to provide a unified settlement layer across all of them.'