Mastercard Adds Stablecoin Settlement for Card Transactions

Mastercard announced its plans to expand its settlement capabilities to let issuers and acquirers settle some card transactions using regulated stablecoins. 

On Wednesday, Mastercard said the new capabilities will include intraday, weekend and holiday card settlement, supporting both fiat currencies and onchain settlement through regulated stablecoins. The company said the new options are designed to give its partners more flexibility in managing settlement liquidity and timing. 

The expansion shows stablecoins moving deeper into mainstream financial infrastructure as major payments networks test tokenized dollars for settlement. It follows Mastercard securing a New York BitLicense in May, allowing its US transaction services unit to conduct regulated digital asset business activity in the state. 

The stablecoin settlement option will support Circle’s USDC, Paxos-issued PYUSD, USDG and USDP, Ripple’s RLUSD and SoFi’s SoFiUSD. Mastercard said the stablecoins will be enabled across supported blockchain networks, including Arbitrum, Base, Canton, Ethereum, Polygon, Solana, Tempo and XRPL.

ARQ, formerly known as DolarApp, CBW Bank, Cross River, Lead Bank and Nuvei are expected to be among the first to support stablecoin settlement optionality in the United States and Latin America, Mastercard said. 

The role stablecoins would play within Mastercard’s ecosystem. Source: Mastercard

Payment firms deepen stablecoin integrations

Mastercard’s settlement expansion with stablecoins follows a series of stablecoin-related moves from major payments and remittance companies. 

Visa said in April that its stablecoin settlement pilot reached a $7 billion annualized run rate, up 50% from the previous quarter, after adding five blockchains to bring its supported settlement networks to nine. The company said the expansion was aimed at giving issuers and acquirers more ways to settle with the network as stablecoins move into mainstream payment flows. 

The stablecoin market is currently valued at about $320 billion.

Related: Solana lands Mastercard, Western Union on new dev platform

The remittance sector has also dived deeper into stablecoins. On Tuesday, MoneyGram launched MGUSD, a USD stablecoin on Stellar, saying that the token would support treasury management settlement and currency trading in the United States, before a broader rollout worldwide.

In early May, Western Union has also launched its US dollar-denominated USDPT stablecoin on Solana, rolling out in the Philippines and Bolivia at launch, with plans to expand in 2026. 

Magazine: Korea’s first memecoin rug-pull case, China’s crypto rules review: Asia Express