Mastercard will expand support for payments in stablecoins in partnership with Circle and Paxos

The payment giant also announced a partnership with crypto exchange OKX

29.04.2025 - 08:40

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What’s new? Mastercard will allow the 150 million merchants in its network to receive payments in stablecoins regardless of the payment method on the buyer’s side. The initiative is in partnership with payment processing company Nuvei and stablecoin issuers Circle and Paxos. In addition, the payment giant has partnered with leading crypto exchange OKX to create a cryptocurrency-enabled bank card to fully support stablecoins and create a seamless ecosystem.

Press release

What else is known? The partnership with OKX aims to give crypto users “easy access to their funds” and integrate stablecoins into everyday transactions.

Mercuryo has partnered with Ledger to launch a crypto debit card for customers in Europe

Users will be able to make fiat purchases directly from non-custodial crypto wallets

Mastercard representatives noted that with increasing global regulatory clarity, stablecoins are evolving from crypto trading tools to mainstream solutions for efficient and programmable payments, disbursements and remittances, and are increasingly being adopted by banks and fintech companies.

Mastercard has proposed its own comprehensive approach to integrate stablecoins into existing financial systems. It already cooperates with such major market players as MetaMask, Kraken, Gemini, Bybit, Crypto.com, Binance, Monavate, and Bleap.

It allows users to earn rewards, pay and spend stablecoins in their crypto wallets using traditional cards around the world, as well as withdraw stablecoins to bank accounts using Mastercard Move.

Fed has withdrawn guidelines for banks on dealing with stablecoins and cooperating with crypto firms

The revocation of the guidelines will accelerate the adoption of cryptocurrency banking

In addition, Mastercard offers a Crypto Credential system to verify blockchain transactions and ensure regulatory compliance, which has already been joined by Wirex, Bit2Me, Lirium, Notabene, Coins.ph, and Mercado Bitcoin.

Finally, its Multi-Token Network (MTN) bank deposit tokenization system is used by JPMorgan Chase and Standard Chartered banks, as well as the Ondo Finance protocol.

Stablecoin sector capitalization has grown 54% since last year to surpass the $230 billion mark, with USDT from Tether and USDC from Circle accounting for 90% of the market. The number of active wallets has also grown 53% year-over-year, according to Artemis and Dune.

Dutch bank ING will launch a stablecoin in compliance with the MiCA law

Several other financial institutions and crypto service providers are partners in the project

Citi Bank believes that a combination of growing regulatory support and adoption by financial institutions has paved the way for the growth of the stablecoin market to $3,7 trillion by 2030.

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