Stablecoins are rapidly moving from the fringes of crypto markets into the core of the global financial system.
Financial institutions anticipate that by 2030, Stablecoins could account for 5% to 10% of global payments, representing $2.1t to $4.2t of value, according to EY-Parthenon estimates.1
Once viewed primarily as trading instruments, they are now emerging as a foundational layer for payments, settlement, and liquidity on the internet.
Regulatory developments such as the passage of the GENIUS Act are accelerating this shift by providing greater legal clarity and signaling institutional acceptance.
As adoption grows, stablecoins are beginning to challenge long-standing assumptions about how money moves, who controls financial rails, and where value is captured.
This momentum presents a pivotal moment for financial institutions.
Stablecoins have the potential to bypass traditional payment infrastructure, compress margins, and alter the balance of power between banks, fintechs, and new blockchain-native players.
At the same time, they offer opportunities to enable real-time settlement, programmable money, and more efficient global trade. As stablecoins increasingly function as digital cash for the internet economy, financial institutions must assess how their business models will be affected and decide whether to position themselves as stablecoin service providers, strategic beneficiaries, or risk being disintermediated altogether.
Business banking today runs on infrastructure that was not designed for a global, real-time digital economy.
Cross-border payments can take days to settle, liquidity is often trapped in multiple jurisdictions, and operational processes remain highly manual and costly. Stablecoins and tokenization directly address many of these long-standing pain points.
Traditional payment and settlement systems rely on batch processing, intermediaries, and limited operating hours, often resulting in settlement cycles measured in days.
Stablecoins enable near-instant 24/7 settlement, significantly reducing counterparty risk and the need for prefunding. For banks, this translates into better liquidity management, lower capital requirements tied up in transit, and improved balance sheet efficiency.
The ability to move value in real time is particularly compelling for treasury operations, cross-border payments, and interbank settlement.
Legacy payment rails are fragmented, jurisdiction-specific, and expensive to maintain. Each layer (correspondent banks, clearing houses, reconciliation processes) adds cost and operational risk.
Stablecoins consolidate many of these functions onto a single, programmable infrastructure. Automated reconciliation, transparent transaction histories, and smart contract–based workflows can materially lower back-office costs while improving accuracy and auditability.
Transaction speed is one of the most visible advantages of stablecoins. Traditional banking systems struggle to compete with blockchain networks that settle transactions in seconds.
This is no longer theoretical: large financial institutions are already deploying stablecoin-based platforms at scale.
JPMorgan’s stablecoin initiatives, facilitating billions of dollars in daily transfers, demonstrate that blockchain-based settlement can meet institutional throughput, reliability, and compliance standards.
As clients increasingly expect real-time payments, instant settlement, and global accessibility, financial institutions that rely solely on legacy infrastructure risk falling behind fintech and blockchain-native competitors.
Integrating stablecoins allows financial institutions to offer faster, cheaper, and more flexible services, particularly for cross-border payments, digital commerce, and corporate treasury clients, without fully abandoning existing systems.
Crypto-based products are already addressing concrete institutional pain points: settlement delays, operational complexity, and capital inefficiency. EY-Parthenon’s research highlights that:
- 41% of users report cost reductions of more than 10%
- 52% of organizations cite lower transaction costs as a primary benefit
- 45% of firms point to faster cross-border payments as a key driver of adoption
Real-world use cases driving adoptionTraditional banks increasingly view cross-border payments as the primary use case for stablecoins, with 58% already deploying them for this purpose.
JPMorgan was among the first major banks to move in this direction, launching its own stablecoin in 2019. Since then, other institutions, including Bank of America and Ally Bank, have started enabling their customers to transact with crypto-focused businesses.
Today, usage is still largely B2B. Around 62% of organizations use stablecoins to pay suppliers across borders, and 53% accept cross-border stablecoin payments from business partners.
However, consumer-facing applications are gaining momentum: 44% of surveyed institutions now accept stablecoin payments from both consumers and vendors.
As adoption broadens across both wholesale and retail segments, stablecoins are poised to redefine how global payment networks operate, where fees are generated, and how value flows through the financial system.
This is an exciting time for financial institutions, full of opportunity but also risk. There will be learning-curves and even delays in adapting an old system to new technology and new assets.
Corporates are looking to their traditional banking partners for access to new payment methods/ stablecoins; to support this need, 79% of financial institutions (FIs) plan to leverage a third party for building out infrastructure.
Ultimately, stablecoins give financial institutions a way to engage with blockchain technology pragmatically without abandoning regulatory discipline or customer trust.
They offer immediate efficiency gains today, while positioning banks for a future in which money, assets, and financial logic are increasingly digital, programmable, and interoperable.
For institutions willing to invest early, stablecoins represent not just a product innovation, but a strategic upgrade to the financial stack itself.
Stablecoins are cryptocurrencies designed to maintain a stable value rather than fluctuate wildly like Bitcoin. They facilitate seamless transactions, store-of-value capabilities, and liquidity management, making them indispensable for traders, investors, and decentralized finance (DeFi) applications. They are usually “pegged” to a stable asset, such as the US dollar, so 1 stablecoin is meant to be worth about $1. This makes them useful for payments, savings, and trading without the price swings common in other cryptocurrencies.
Tokenization is the process of turning something real or digital (like money, a house, art, or even data) into a digital token that lives on a blockchain. That token represents ownership or value and can be easily stored, transferred, or traded online without the need for middlemen like banks or brokers.
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