Visa partners with BVNK to connect a $1.7 trillion network, enabling businesses to settle stablecoins 24/7

Visa and BVNK collaborate to integrate stablecoins into the $1.7 trillion annual Visa Direct platform, enabling 24-hour cross-border settlements for businesses. Visa stablecoin settlements reach an annualized $4.5 billion, accounting for just 0.03%, but with significant monthly growth. The market cap of stablecoins has reached $270 billion, with banks like Goldman Sachs and UBS exploring their own stablecoins.

$1.7 Trillion Payment Network Opens Stablecoin Tracks

Global payments giant Visa officially announces a partnership with London-based stablecoin infrastructure provider BVNK, aiming to integrate stablecoin payment capabilities into its Visa Direct platform. This integration will allow businesses to use stablecoins for fund pre-deposits and disbursements within Visa Direct, a real-time payment network handling up to $1.7 trillion annually.

According to a joint press release on Wednesday, BVNK will provide the underlying stablecoin technology support, enabling qualified corporate clients to send digital dollars directly to recipients’ stablecoin wallets. The core of this collaboration is to break the traditional fiat currency track’s spatial and temporal limitations. Mark Nelsen, Visa’s global product head, stated that stablecoins can operate continuously during weekends, holidays, or bank settlement system downtimes, presenting an exciting opportunity for global liquidity.

Through integration with BVNK, companies can leverage Visa’s extensive global payout network without developing complex blockchain asset management systems themselves, enabling real-time settlements across different markets. This has significant potential in high-frequency payment scenarios such as payroll, gig economy rewards, and cross-border remittances. Traditional bank cross-border transfers typically take 3 to 5 business days, but stablecoins can complete these transactions in minutes with substantially lower fees.

This strategic partnership did not happen overnight. As early as May 2025, Visa’s venture capital arm, Visa Ventures, invested in BVNK’s $50 million Series B funding round, demonstrating Visa’s long-term commitment to stablecoin infrastructure. Additionally, in October 2025, Citi Ventures, a subsidiary of Citigroup, made a strategic investment in BVNK, further solidifying its position as a provider of stablecoin solutions with over $30 billion in annual stablecoin transaction volume.

Rapid Growth with $4.5 Billion Settlement Scale

Although stablecoins are still in early adoption stages among mainstream merchants, transaction data shows strong growth trends. Cuy Sheffield, head of cryptocurrency at Visa, told Reuters that by January 2026, Visa’s stablecoin settlement annualized volume had reached $4.5 billion. While this is only 0.03% of Visa’s total $14.2 trillion in payments processed in 2025, Sheffield emphasized that the figure is growing significantly month-over-month, mainly driven by stablecoin card issuers.

Currently, despite the large issuance of digital assets—such as Tether’s USDT with a circulation of about $187 billion—consumers still find it difficult to use these tokens directly at most physical stores. Therefore, stablecoin companies rely heavily on Visa’s existing payment network to convert digital assets into real-world purchasing power. This is why Visa is committed to positioning itself as a key bridge between stablecoins and existing merchant acceptance ecosystems.

To better understand market dynamics, Visa has partnered with blockchain analytics platform Allium Labs to develop data tracking tools. Their latest data shows that the global stablecoin market cap exceeds $270 billion, more than doubling from $120 billion two years ago. However, out of the $47 trillion in recorded stablecoin transactions on blockchain, Visa’s filtered data indicates only $10.4 trillion represent “adjusted” real payment activity.

Sheffield explained that most data noise comes from high-frequency trading bots arbitraging across exchanges and other non-payment on-chain activities. Visa aims to filter out these automated activities to restore the true utilization of stablecoins in commercial transactions. This data cleansing capability allows Visa to more accurately assess the real market size of stablecoin payments and inform future strategic deployments.

Bank Giants’ Stablecoin Counterattack

As stablecoin infrastructure matures, traditional banks are beginning to see potential threats and opportunities. Major financial institutions including Goldman Sachs, UBS, Bank of America, Citigroup, Western Union, Interactive Brokers, and BNY Mellon announced in 2025 that they are exploring issuing their own stablecoins to prevent digital assets from undermining their dominance in traditional global fund flows.

Three Main Strategies for Banking Sector Response

Issuing Own Stablecoins: Banks like Goldman Sachs and UBS explore bank-grade stablecoins leveraging existing regulatory frameworks and brand trust.

Regional Alliances: The European Banking Union develops euro-pegged stablecoins to challenge the dollar-dominated digital payment landscape.

Technology Platform Collaborations: Partnering with providers like Visa and BVNK to quickly gain stablecoin payment capabilities instead of developing from scratch.

In Europe, to counter the long-standing dominance of the dollar in digital payments, banks such as ING and UniCredit have jointly established a company to develop euro-pegged stablecoins. Sheffield expressed excitement about the prospects of euro-pegged stablecoins and believes the story of stablecoins should not be limited to the dollar; multi-currency digitalization worldwide will be a major trend in the future.

This competitive environment has also prompted Visa to strengthen its consulting services. Last month, Visa launched the “Global Stablecoin Advisory Practice,” guiding banks, fintechs, and enterprises on how to develop market growth strategies and operate compliant stablecoin businesses within legal frameworks. For Visa, stablecoins have shifted from experimental technology to an “invisible pipeline” of the financial system.

Regulatory Compliance and BVNK’s Strategic Choices

As stablecoins enter mainstream use, their operational environment faces increasingly strict legal constraints. The U.S. GENIUS Act establishes federal standards for payment stablecoins, requiring payment platforms to support only regulated tokens. BVNK’s spokesperson stated that stablecoin disbursements are strictly limited to compliant wallets and counterparties, aligned with evolving legal frameworks such as the EU’s MiCAR and new U.S. regulations.

Experts warn that although stablecoins can significantly reduce settlement delays—transforming traditional banking systems reliant on banking hours into 24/7 networks—their long-term impact depends on how quickly local currency infrastructure adapts to these new technological tracks and incorporates regulation. Against this backdrop, the pilot cooperation between Visa and BVNK is particularly significant.

These pilots will initially launch in markets with high demand for digital asset payments and clear regulatory environments. The first clients will include payment service providers (PSPs), online marketplaces, and intermediary platforms. BVNK CEO Jesse Hemson-Struthers said this integration marks a key milestone in embedding stablecoins directly into the most trusted payment networks worldwide, providing businesses with more flexible disbursement options and greater flexibility for end recipients.

Notably, before reaching this agreement with Visa, BVNK had negotiated a potential acquisition with Coinbase valued at up to $2 billion, but both parties ultimately terminated the deal after due diligence in November 2025. This strategic choice indicates BVNK’s preference for deep cooperation with Visa rather than becoming part of Coinbase through acquisition. Partnering with a payments giant allows faster access to enterprise clients and mainstream markets, which may be a key reason BVNK declined Coinbase’s offer.