Morning Minute: Western Union Chooses Solana for Stablecoin

Morning Minute is a daily newsletter written by Tyler Warner. The analysis and opinions expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Decrypt. Subscribe to the Morning Minute on Substack.

GM!

Today’s top news:

• Crypto majors fall 1-2% ahead of FOMC today; BTC at $113,200
• Bitwise SOL ETF breaks 2025 record for launch day volume
• Western Union announced stablecoin on Solana
• MetaMask introduces Season 1 of rewards with $30M up for grabs
• Monad begins 3-day airdrop reveal campaign

💸 Western Union Chooses Solana for Stablecoin

The world’s biggest money transfer company is going on-chain.

And it didn’t pick Ethereum or Bitcoin.

📌 What Happened

Western Union, the 173-year-old global money transfer giant, just announced it’s launching a stablecoin on Solana.

Western Union will issue a U.S. dollar stablecoin called USDPT, built on Solana, with custody provided by Anchorage Digital.

The rollout begins in 2026, targeting hundreds of millions of users across LatAm, Africa, and Southeast Asia, regions where stablecoins already dominate real economic usage.

The stablecoin will plug straight into Western Union’s existing licensed fiat rails and 4,500+ corridors, enabling people to move dollars across borders without banks, ACH delays, or predatory FX fees.

And here’s the curveball: Western Union says it plans to keep supporting cash-in and cash-out locations, effectively becoming a global on/off ramp for Solana.

🗣️ What They’re Saying

“For 175 years, we’ve been connecting people, moving $150 billion a year. Digital assets is the next evolution. We looked at alternatives, and came to the conclusion that Solana was the right choice.” – Devin McGranahan, CEO of Western Union

🧠 Why It Matters

The largest remittance company on earth is stepping directly into stablecoins.

This is massive for both Solana and stablecoins.

Solana just got validation from a major payments player on a global scale.

Payments is crypto’s biggest real-world use case today, and Solana now anchors the largest remittance migration play in history.

As for stablecoins, the are clearly eating the world, and Western Union is capitulating in.

Global remittances are a $860 billion market. If even 10% of those flows move to stablecoins over the next two years, that’s $86 billion in annual on-chain volume.

Largely on Solana.

Stablecoins are the future – and Solana is a part of that future.

A really nice narrative win, on the same day that Bitwise’s Solana ETF set the record for highest volume for any new ETF launch in 2025.

I wonder if BlackRock is watching…

🌎 Macro Crypto and Memes

A few Crypto and Web3 headlines that caught my eye:

• Crypto majors are red ahead of today’s FOMC; BTC -1% at $113,100, ETH -3% at $4,000, BNB -2% at $1,115, SOL even at $199
• TRUMP (+19%), Pi (+14%) and AERO (+6%) led top movers
• Trump Media introduced a new prediction market called Truth Predict
• Visa will start taking payments in four different stablecoins across four blockchains, with the ability to convert them back into fiat,
• Circle’s Arc blockchain went live in testnet
• BlackRock’s tokenization platform Securitize shared plans to go public via a $1.25B SPAC
• Ethereum “Fusaka” upgrade cleared its final test billed as key to L2 scaling; mainnet next
• TeraWulf stock soared as Google-backed AI expansion miner pivots to AI infra; shares pop
• Indiana police recovered 1,000 stolen BTC miners and $75K in frozen turkeys in an unusual bust

In Corporate Treasuries / ETFs

In Memes

💰 Token, Airdrop & Protocol Tracker

Here’s a rundown of major token, protocol and airdrop news from the day:

• MetaMask introduced their Season 1 of rewards with $30M up for grabs over the next 90 days; users must update to the latest MM version on iOS to participate
• MegaETH’s public ICO has already seen $700M+ raised with just over 1 day left (15x oversubscribed)
• Polymarket teased its US launch coming within weeks with a focus on sports
• Monad’s airdrop claim reveal went live for day 1 of a 3 day event, showing recipients how many tokens they’ll be able to claim at TGE
• Myriad launched on BNB with new BNB-focused markets + automated markets that resolve every 5 minutes based on price action

🚚 What is happening in NFTs?

Here is the list of other notable headlines from the day in NFTs:

• NFT leaders were flat on the day; Punks even at 39 ETH, Pudgy +1% at 6.95, BAYC -1% at 6.5 ETH; Hypurr’s -1% at 1,190 HYPE
• Fly The Kite (+17%) were a notable mover
• The NFT Strategies were red with PNKSTR falling 15%
• Doodles announced a spooky Telegram drop with Universal Monsters