Visa Unleashes Stablecoin Revolution: Settlement, Issuance, and Cross-Border Payments Transformed

Visa just dropped a blockchain bomb on traditional finance.

The payments giant is turbocharging its stablecoin capabilities across three critical fronts—settlement systems, digital asset issuance, and international payment corridors.

Settlement systems get blockchain boost

Visa's infrastructure now processes stablecoin settlements at speeds that make legacy systems look like dial-up. Financial institutions can move value across borders without the usual banking bottlenecks.

Digital issuance goes mainstream

The platform enables businesses to launch and manage stablecoins with enterprise-grade security. No more wrestling with complex blockchain protocols—Visa handles the technical heavy lifting.

Cross-border payments slashed

International transfers that typically take days now clear in seconds. The system bypasses correspondent banking networks entirely—cutting out the middlemen who've been skimming fees for decades.

Because apparently what finance really needed was another layer of complexity wrapped in blockchain buzzwords. But hey—at least this one actually works.

Visa is significantly expanding its stablecoin infrastructure, adding support for four stablecoins across four unique blockchains as the payment network positions digital dollars at the center of its cross-border and emerging market strategy.

CEO Ryan McInerney announced during the company's fourth quarter fiscal 2025 earnings call that Visa's stablecoin settlement platform now accepts and converts two currencies to over 25 traditional fiat currencies, while stablecoin-linked Visa card spending quadrupled year-over-year in the quarter.

"Since 2020, we've facilitated over $140 billion in crypto and stablecoin flows, including Visa users purchasing more than $100 billion of crypto and stablecoin assets using their Visa credentials and spending more than $35 billion in crypto and stablecoin assets using Visa credentials," McInerney said.

The company said it operates more than 130 stablecoin-linked card issuing programs across 40+ countries, with monthly settlement volume surpassing a $2.5 billion annualized run rate. Visa has begun enabling banks to mint and burn their own stablecoins through the Visa Tokenized Asset Platform.

In September 2025, Visa announced a stablecoin pre-funding pilot for Visa Direct targeting banks, remitters, and financial institutions seeking faster, more flexible liquidity management. The initiative represents Visa's push to integrate stablecoin capabilities into cross-border money movement infrastructure.

"The areas where there's product-market fit for stablecoins in the world are the areas where there's significant TAMs and largely where we're underpenetrated. That's emerging markets, and that's cross-border money movement," McInerney stated. "We have a DEEP product pipeline focused on putting products to market against both of those areas of opportunity."

The CEO emphasized opportunities across remittances, B2B payments, and gig economy payouts, noting that a significant portion of Visa's product roadmap targets capturing cross-border money movement through stablecoin integration.

Visa is also leveraging stablecoins to modernize its settlement network and working with clients through its consulting business on stablecoin implementations. The initiatives span issuance, settlement, and money movement capabilities integrated into Visa's broader platform.

"I don't ever recall being so excited about the opportunities ahead of this company," McInerney said, highlighting stablecoins alongside agentic commerce and other initiatives as key growth drivers.

CFO Chris Suh emphasized continued investment in stablecoin opportunities during the call. "Across our industry, as things continue to MOVE as fast as they are, you've heard a lot of the conversation even today around agentic commerce and stablecoin. We think it's important that we continue to invest in these opportunities from our position," Suh stated.

The stablecoin expansion forms part of Visa's "Visa-as-a-Service" stack, which McInerney described as comprising foundation, services, and solutions layers. The company's network of networks now includes approximately 12 billion endpoints spanning 4 billion cards, bank accounts, and digital wallets each.

Visa reported fourth quarter fiscal 2025 net revenue growth of 12% year-over-year and earnings per share growth of 10%, capping full-year performance of 11% revenue and 14% EPS growth. Management guided for low double-digit revenue and EPS growth in fiscal 2026, supported by investments in stablecoins, AI, and agentic commerce.

The company expects to enhance cross-border offerings, scale recently launched products, and expand stablecoin capabilities in fiscal 2026, focusing investments on specific commercial vertical opportunities and building new Visa Direct product capabilities for cross-border money movement.