Stablecoins Are Disrupting Traditional Finance—And Banks Haven’t Noticed Yet

Move over, legacy banks—algorithmic dollar-pegged tokens are eating your lunch.

The stealth takeover

While Wall Street obsesses over Bitcoin ETFs, stablecoins quietly process more daily volume than Visa. No permission slips. No 'business hours'. Just 24/7 global settlements that cut out correspondent banking like a hot knife through butter.

Why regulators are sweating

Tether's market cap now rivals the GDP of small nations—and that's before you count the 'black swan' of CBDCs waiting in the wings. The Fed's real worry? Stablecoins work better than Fedwire.

The cynical take

Watch banks suddenly 'discover' blockchain tech once they realize stablecoins saved more in compliance costs than their entire 2023 profits.

Game recognizes game—and decentralized finance just leveled the playing field.

Europe

The European Union was the first governing body to blink first across the Atlantic. The Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) came into full force at the end of 2024 and offers a streamlined approach to regulation, prioritising consumer protection and anti-money laundering. The pro-consumer stablecoin landscape in the EU has allowed crypto to infiltrate everyday citizens’ lives like a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Trust and the implementation of robust, clear user guidance have been critical in the implementation of MiCA by the European Banking Authority. As a result, the stability created in the market led to an increase in EURC stablecoin transactions, from $7m to $21m between December and January 2025. There is a clear need, facilitated through banking institutions, for everyday consumers for stablecoins, especially in Europe, as cross-border transactions and remittance continue to become disproportionately more important in a world getting more comfortable with mass migration and open borders.

The United States

In the U.S., stablecoins have had a more nuanced path to infiltrating everyday use cases. JP Morgan may have been one of the first movers when it came to cross-institutional payments, but the U.S. opened the floodgates early, and under Gary Gensler, crypto was a hostage to archaic hang-ups and tin foil hat-inspired rhetoric, with Gensler claiming crypto was “unlikely [to] be a currency”, thanks to the fact that “the leading lights of this field are either in jail or awaiting extradition”. Crypto was never going to show its best side pre-regulation, and since Donald TRUMP took the White House in 2025, crypto regulation in the US is evolving at a rate not seen before; cue the GENIUS act.

The Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act, for the first time, gives both issuers and users of stablecoins clarity on their lawfulness within society and how they can be used. With this, the CFTC has also been announced as the primary regulator of digital commodities and payment stablecoins, further legitimising its position as part of the traditional finance furniture in the U.S. While the industry is still in its infancy compared to the EU, the impact that robust regulation will have for the rest of the world will be disproportionately more important. If the world salutes the Euro, then it bows to the dollar, and stablecoins will add yet another arrow to the dollar’s ever-growing quiver.

Now that the stage is set and the world’s largest players have clarity, stablecoin adoption at both the institutional and consumer level is set to go supernova. Leading UK bank Standard Chartered has estimated the GENIUS act will “cause total stablecoin supply to rise from $230bn to $2tn by end-2028”.

One of the largest infiltrations into traditional finance to date is the transfer of U.S. treasuries to stablecoin issuers, with $1.2tn in U.S. debt set to be bought by Tether, Circle, and other dollar-pegged cryptocurrencies by 2030. Once reserved for institutional stalwarts like Berkshire Hathaway, crypto is pulling up a seat at the TradFi table and is set to have a larger piece of the treasury pie than China, Japan & the UK in just five years.

With the GENIUS Act and MiCA in full swing, and institutional driving stablecoin transactions, it will not be long before a lot of the FIAT capital FLOW globally will be represented by stablecoins. The Vice President of blockchain and digital assets at Mastercard, Raj Dhamodharan, recently highlighted that “most people won’t even know they’re using stablecoins” as the digital infrastructure required for crypto adoption is already in place.

The physical money that backs up the number on our banking app will soon be pegged to a digital dollar or euro without most of the world ever knowing. It may sound strange, but if anything, banking is simply catching up with consumer demands—and although this revolution will be silent, its impact over the coming years will speak volumes.

Mateusz Kara is the co-founder and CEO of Ari10, a leading European fiat-crypto payments gateway.