Cobo Stablecoin Weekly Report NO.30: Ripple's Comeback with a $40 Billion Valuation and the Stablecoin Transformation of a Cross-Border Remittance Giant

Welcome to the 30th issue of the Cobo Stablecoin Weekly Report.

The efficiency dividend brought by stablecoins in cross-border payments is an irreversible technological revolution. Its power is forcing traditional financial giants to reposition themselves from the bottom up (vertically), while also sparking fierce confrontations over monetary sovereignty and regulation between nations (horizontally).

Incumbents no longer have a choice—they must join the battle.

This week, we focus on enterprise and market transformation driven by stablecoins.

In the Global South, high inflation and insufficient infrastructure have created financially promising markets. Western Union and Zepz are both targeting this opportunity, but with completely different approaches: the former relies on a physical agent network to build the "last mile" for stablecoins, while the latter integrates storage, payments, and wealth management through a digital dollar wallet, attempting to shape a new consumer financial gateway. Meanwhile, Latin American exchange Ripio has launched a stablecoin pegged to local currencies, aiming to promote regional payment network autonomy and low friction through de-dollarization. This is not only a demonstration of business transformation for exchanges but also an experiment in monetary sovereignty.

In the Northern markets, stablecoins are driving the reconstruction of enterprise-level financial infrastructure. This week’s protagonist, Ripple, has completed full-stack integration of issuance, custody, treasury management, and settlement through six acquisitions in two years, raising its valuation to $40 billion, surpassing Circle, and achieving a transformation from token narrative to enterprise-level revenue-driven business. This demonstrates how stablecoins are becoming the new core of competitiveness for enterprises in the Northern markets.

Market Overview and Growth Highlights

Total stablecoin market capitalization reached $305.206b (about 305.206 billion USD), a week-on-week decrease of $2.17B (about 2.17 billion USD). In terms of market structure, USDT continues to dominate with a 60.07% share; USDC ranks second with a market cap of $74.898b (about 74.898 billion USD), accounting for 24.54%.

Blockchain Network Distribution

Top 3 Networks by Stablecoin Market Cap:

1. Ethereum: $166.815b (166.815 billion USD)
2. Tron: $78.312b (78.312 billion USD)
3. Solana: $13.824b (13.824 billion USD)

Top 3 Fastest Growing Networks This Week:

1. Circle USYC (USYC): +14.87%
2. CASH (CASH): +14.06%
3. Ripple USD (RLUSD): +12.82%

Data from DefiLlama

🎯From Crypto Narrative to Financial Infrastructure: Ripple Realizes "Stablecoin Era" Transformation with $40 Billion Valuation

This Wednesday, Ripple announced the completion of a $500 million funding round, bringing its latest valuation to $40 billion. This marks the transformation of a crypto-native company centered on the crypto narrative into a regulated, institution-facing financial technology infrastructure provider, finally gaining recognition from the capital markets. This round was led by top traditional financial institutions such as Citadel Securities and Fortress, with a valuation surpassing Circle’s $30 billion market cap, despite the latter having a larger stablecoin circulation ($70 billion) and a multi-billion dollar revenue base. This sends a clear signal: real revenue and regulatory clarity are enabling Ripple to obtain the most scarce asset it has long sought—legitimacy.

In the past two years, Ripple has completed six acquisitions totaling over $3 billion, decisively accelerating its entry into the institutional crypto infrastructure track through "M&A"—acquiring treasury management company GTreasury for $1 billion; cross-asset broker Hidden Road for $1.25 billion; Canadian payments company Rail for $200 million; and building full-stack infrastructure from secure custody to high-frequency wallets through the acquisitions of Metaco, Standard Custody, and Palisade. Thus, Ripple has transformed from a token-driven payments company into an institutional crypto infrastructure provider, integrating stablecoin issuance, custody, enterprise treasury management, and settlement on one platform.

As its business landscape is reshaped, Ripple’s target market has expanded to the trillion-dollar enterprise finance sector—a track where liquidity, settlement certainty, and regulatory trust are key. Ripple’s acquisitions are paving the way: GTreasury brings Ripple into treasury systems managing trillions of dollars and connects to Fortune 500 cash flow systems; Metaco provides bank-grade custody capabilities; Palisade’s Wallet-as-a-Service supports high-frequency wallet deployment; Rail opens up real transaction flows for global B2B stablecoin payments; and 75 regulatory licenses worldwide ensure compliant operations across markets and jurisdictions. All these businesses generate real revenue. Ripple’s annual payment volume has reached $95 billion, and its stablecoin RLUSD, launched less than a year ago, has already surpassed $1 billion in circulation. This structure represents visible income, a solid customer base, and clear regulatory certainty, which are the core values supporting Ripple as a full-stack financial infrastructure provider.

Ripple is applying for an OCC banking license and a Federal Reserve master account. Once approved, the company will be able to eliminate reliance on third-party custody and clearing, directly access the Federal Reserve’s payment infrastructure, and achieve internal vertical integration from issuance and clearing to software delivery, providing a full suite of solutions for institutional clients. At that point, Ripple will no longer just be a "bridge between traditional finance and crypto," but will control both ends of the bridge, eliminating intermediary costs, delays, and risks, and standing shoulder to shoulder with financial giants like Visa and Mastercard in the institutional payments field. However, Ripple still faces technical shortcomings: its cross-border payments and most RLUSD settlements still rely on the decade-old XRPL network, which is stable and reliable but lags behind Solana and Ethereum L2 in programmability and DeFi compatibility. To reduce this reliance, Ripple is building a multi-chain architecture through the acquisitions of GTreasury, Hidden Road, and Rail, deploying RLUSD on both XRPL and Ethereum, and may migrate key businesses to higher-performance or more open public chains in the future, making XRPL the payment layer while Ripple itself evolves into a complete "digital asset operating system."

🎯When Cross-Border Remittance Meets Stablecoins: Two Futures for Western Union and Zepz

Stablecoins have solved the on-chain to on-chain efficiency problem, but so far, the exchange between "digital dollars <-> physical cash" remains the only and largest friction and obstacle. Solving this friction requires a massive physical network, high compliance costs, and years of trust accumulation. This friction also contains huge commercial value. In the Global South, two cross-border remittance giants—Western Union and Zepz Group—are leveraging this to reinvent themselves, representing two completely different evolutionary directions in the stablecoin era.

Western Union, a century-old remittance network with over 500,000 locations in 200+ countries, plans to issue the USD-pegged stablecoin USDPT on Solana in the first half of 2026, with Anchorage Digital as custodian. At the same time, it has launched a "Digital Asset Network," platformizing its physical agent network.

By issuing its own stablecoin USDPT, Western Union not only earns interest income from investing reserves (i.e., float) in low-risk assets such as government bonds, but its more important moat is its physical network spanning Latin America, Africa, and South Asia—regions with high regulatory barriers and where cash remains mainstream. This is infrastructure that no digital-native company can easily replicate. In these regions, the stablecoin world still struggles to penetrate, and Western Union’s network is the necessary channel for "on-chain value landing." For wallet providers, DeFi applications, exchanges, and even large payment networks, converting on-chain funds to cash or onboarding cash users to the chain ultimately requires Western Union to complete the final conversion.

This elevates Western Union from a traditional remittance company to the "physical base station" of the blockchain world, serving as the final interface between virtual value and the real economy. Its business model thus forms a three-layer structure: reserve interest income, on/off-ramp fees for cash-to-chain and chain-to-cash, and adoption incentives from public chains—reportedly, Western Union has received an eight-figure ecosystem subsidy from Solana for this initiative. With this model, Western Union is transforming from a single remittance channel into the key underlying infrastructure of the global stablecoin system, connecting the "last mile" of the crypto network.

If Western Union is connecting the physical world to the blockchain, Zepz is taking another path—starting from digital remittance, using stablecoins as the core to build a financial gateway for emerging markets. Headquartered in London, Zepz has millions of users and serves over 300 million migrants worldwide. In a high-inflation environment, stablecoins are becoming their private dollarization tool for hedging and storing value.

This week, Zepz partnered with Bridge to allow users to spend digital dollar balances directly at global Visa merchants, with real-time local currency settlement in the background, upgrading the stablecoin wallet from a single storage account to a "digital dollar account" that can be spent and used for cross-border payments. Next, Zepz will add on-chain yield products such as staking or lending and interest-bearing products to its app, packaging them as local wealth management tools with a simplified interface. In this way, Zepz is gradually evolving into the "consumer bank of the Global South"—a stablecoin super-app that integrates savings, spending, and wealth management.

Capital Deployment

💰Zynk Raises $5 Million from Coinbase Ventures and Others to Build Stablecoin Payment Infrastructure

Key Highlights

• Cross-border payment infrastructure company Zynk has completed a $5 million seed round led by Hivemind Capital, with participation from Coinbase Ventures, Alliance DAO, and others. The funding, in the form of a SAFE agreement, was completed in August;
• Zynk provides stablecoin-driven cross-border payment solutions, supporting instant settlement without pre-funding. By embedding liquidity directly into the network, it eliminates the need for payment companies to pre-fund or manage complex liquidity operations in different markets;
• The company already supports multi-currency settlement channels including USD, EUR, AED, INR, MXN, and PHP, and has achieved 70% month-on-month growth since its quiet launch in April.

Why It Matters

• Zynk is addressing the core pain point of the cross-border payments industry—pre-funding requirements, which have long been a moat for the cross-border payments market. The company’s 15-member team includes former Amazon Pay India CTO and former Morgan Stanley capital markets professionals, aiming to "move liquidity like data" and provide global expansion capabilities without liquidity bottlenecks for remittance providers, B2B payment platforms, and payment service providers.

💰Ripple Acquires Crypto Wallet Company Palisade, Expands Institutional Payments Business

Key Highlights

• Ripple announced the acquisition of crypto wallet provider Palisade, integrating its wallet-as-a-service platform into Ripple Custody to provide banks and enterprises with more robust custody services for digital assets, stablecoins, and tokenized physical assets;
• Palisade brings technology needed for high-speed, high-frequency scenarios, such as on/off-chain channels or enterprise payment processes, supports multiple blockchains and interaction with DeFi protocols, and helps fintech companies quickly create wallets for new users or manage global treasury operations for enterprises;
• This is Ripple’s fourth acquisition this year, following the acquisitions of prime broker Hidden Road ($1.25 billion), stablecoin infrastructure company Rail ($200 million), and treasury management platform GTreasury, as well as Swiss custody company Metaco in 2023.

Why It Matters

• Ripple’s strategy of building a crypto-native alternative to traditional financial infrastructure through intensive acquisitions is becoming increasingly clear, forming a complete institutional-grade digital asset service ecosystem from cross-border payments, liquidity, stablecoin issuance to secure asset management tools. According to Ripple President Monica Long, as stablecoin payments rapidly gain popularity, Palisade’s technology will perfectly complement the fast-growing needs of Ripple Payments. With 75 global regulatory licenses and support for financial institutions such as BBVA, DBS Bank, and Societe Generale’s crypto division, Ripple is consolidating its leading position in institutional payments and digital asset management through these strategic moves.

💰Arx Research Raises $6.1 Million Seed Round, Launches "Burner Terminal" Payment Device

Key Highlights

• Arx Research has raised a $6.1 million seed round led by Castle Island Ventures, launching the "Burner Terminal" device that can accept cryptocurrency, stablecoins, and traditional payments simultaneously;
• The Burner Terminal will be available in early 2026, priced under $200, supporting tap-to-pay, QR code scanning, and traditional credit card payments, with no additional gas fees required;
• The device will initially support USD II and USDC on the Base network, with plans to expand to more networks and stablecoins in 2026, and will partner with Flexa to provide broad crypto payment support.

Why It Matters

• This device provides merchants with a free option to directly accept stablecoins, solving the "last mile" problem of crypto payments in physical retail scenarios, bringing the tap-to-pay experience from traditional finance into the crypto space, and creating a convenient solution for small merchants to accept multiple payment methods with a single device.

Regulatory Compliance

🏛️Circle Submits GENIUS Act Implementation Recommendations, Urges Unified Stablecoin Regulatory Framework

Key Highlights

• On November 4, 2025, Circle submitted GENIUS Act implementation opinions to the US Treasury, emphasizing that the Act not only sets regulatory standards for stablecoins but also lays the foundation for a federal digital payments framework in the US;
• Circle recommends that all digital assets designed to maintain stable value should follow the same regulatory obligations, and that banks, non-banks, domestic or foreign issuers should compete on a level playing field;
• It is recommended that regulation ensure capital and liquidity requirements fully consider the risk characteristics of stablecoin issuance, and provide clear global operating guidelines for US stablecoin issuers to support interoperability with global financial institutions.

Why It Matters

• Proper implementation of the GENIUS Act can unify standards and improve transparency, promote US leadership in digital finance by setting clear definitions, risk-sensitive prudential requirements, and predictable enforcement mechanisms, while guiding market demand toward transparent, fully reserved, and compliant stablecoin products.

🏛️Coinbase Urges Treasury to Keep GENIUS Act Implementation Rules Consistent with Congressional Intent

Key Highlights

• Coinbase submitted feedback to the US Treasury, urging that the GENIUS Act implementation rules strictly follow Congressional intent and avoid regulatory overreach beyond what is explicitly required by the law;
• The crypto exchange proposes that regulators interpret the law narrowly, excluding non-financial software, blockchain validators, and open-source protocols from the regulatory scope;
• Coinbase points out that the interest payment ban in the Act applies only to stablecoin issuers, not intermediaries or exchanges offering loyalty rewards, and suggests that payment stablecoins be treated as cash equivalents for tax purposes.

Why It Matters

• The GENIUS Act, signed into law in July 2025, establishes a federal framework for regulating stablecoins. Coinbase warns that overregulation could stifle innovation and undermine the Act’s goal of making the US the "crypto capital of the world."

🏛️Traditional Banking Sector Resists Coinbase’s Application for Federal Trust Bank License

Key Highlights

• The Independent Community Bankers of America (ICBA) submitted a petition to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), requesting the rejection of Coinbase’s federal trust license application, claiming the crypto exchange fails to meet requirements in several areas;
• Wall Street lobbying group Bank Policy Institute (BPI) also opposed trust applications from Ripple, Circle, and Paxos last week, and again raised objections to Coinbase on Monday;
• The ICBA letter points out that Coinbase Trust Bank would struggle to be profitable in a bear market, the OCC would find it difficult to safely dissolve a failed trust, and Coinbase National Trust Company relies on "obviously flawed risk and control functions."

Why It Matters

• The regulatory boundary dispute between traditional banking and the crypto industry is intensifying, with banks trying to prevent crypto firms from entering domains they once fully controlled. Coinbase Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal responded on social media, saying bankers are "trying to dig regulatory moats to protect themselves." Notably, the OCC is now led by Jonathan Gould, appointed by pro-crypto President Trump. As former Chief Legal Officer of Bitfury, he has criticized the banking industry’s unfriendly attitude toward crypto. This regulatory decision will have a significant demonstration effect on crypto firms obtaining banking licenses and could influence the integration of the entire industry with the traditional financial system.

🏛️EU Plans to Establish SEC-Style Single Regulator to Oversee Crypto and Stock Exchanges

Key Highlights

• The European Commission will propose in December to establish a single regulator modeled after the US SEC, unifying oversight of stock exchanges, crypto exchanges, and clearinghouses, with support from European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde;
• One possible plan is to expand the powers of the existing European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) to cover major cross-border financial entities, including stock exchanges, crypto companies, and other post-trade infrastructure;
• This move aims to make it easier for small financial startups to expand across borders without needing approval from numerous regional and national regulators, though small countries with financial centers such as Luxembourg and Dublin are skeptical.

Why It Matters

• The EU is moving toward a "Capital Markets Union," seeking to simplify the regulatory environment for cross-border financial services by centralizing regulatory power. If passed, this proposal will have a profound impact on the European crypto industry, enabling crypto firms to face a unified rather than fragmented regulatory framework. This move echoes recent EU initiatives in stablecoin regulation, digital euro CBDC roadmap, and real-world asset tokenization, showing the EU’s comprehensive push toward centralized digital financial regulation. If the proposal is made in December, it will begin the legislative process with the European Parliament and Council, including amendments and trilogues, which may last until 2026. This change will bring the European regulatory structure closer to the US model and could potentially alter the competitive landscape of Europe’s crypto and traditional financial markets.

🏛️Opinion: MiCA Unlikely to Prevent Stablecoin Crisis, May Conceal Systemic Risks

Key Highlights

• The EU’s MiCA regulation standardizes stablecoins through reserve proof, capital rules, and redemption requirements, but Daniele D’Alvia, Deputy Director of the School of Law at Queen Mary University of London, believes this micro-level regulation ignores macro systemic risks. As stablecoins scale up, they may trigger large-scale migration of bank deposits to crypto assets;
• Bank of England Governor Bailey warns that "widely used stablecoins should be regulated like banks," and proposes a cap of £10,000–£20,000 for individuals and £10 million for corporates holding systemic stablecoins, indicating central banks are aware of the potential threat stablecoins pose to monetary sovereignty;
• Strict regulation may lead to regulatory arbitrage, pushing issuers to offshore jurisdictions with looser oversight, shifting rather than eliminating risks, and creating new forms of shadow banking systems.

Why It Matters

• While MiCA provides legitimacy for stablecoins, it may also plant hidden dangers for the financial system. As stablecoins gain official recognition and widespread use, their boundaries with the traditional financial system blur, and demand for stablecoin reserve assets could trigger sovereign debt sell-offs during market turmoil. Stablecoins are becoming key infrastructure at the intersection of DeFi and traditional finance, and regulators need to go beyond treating them as ordinary asset classes to understand their systemic impact as a new form of money. The current regulatory framework overlooks macro-level risk control tools such as issuance limits, liquidity tools, or crisis management frameworks, which may allow stablecoins to bring more problems than they solve after gaining legal status.

🏛️Swiss Crypto Bank AMINA Obtains Austrian MiCA License, Accelerates EU Market Expansion

Key Highlights

• Swiss digital asset bank AMINA (formerly SEBA Bank) has obtained a MiCA regulatory license from the Austrian Financial Market Authority (FMA) and will provide compliant crypto services across the EU through its subsidiary AMINA EU;
• AMINA EU will offer crypto trading, custody, portfolio management, and staking services to professional investors, family offices, corporates, and financial institutions, laying the foundation for its European market expansion;
• AMINA chose Austria as its entry point to the European market mainly for its strict regulatory standards and commitment to investor protection. Austria has become the European regulatory base for well-known crypto companies such as Bitpanda and Bybit.

Why It Matters

• As a multi-jurisdictional compliant institution holding Swiss FINMA banking license and crypto licenses in Hong Kong and Abu Dhabi, AMINA will be able to provide EU professional investors with a full range of services from bank accounts to crypto loans. Although the MiCA framework unifies EU crypto regulation, the Austrian FMA, together with French and Italian regulators, has called for strengthened control over MiCA, indicating that EU crypto regulation is still evolving. AMINA’s European expansion will provide more compliant channels for institutional investors to participate in the crypto market and accelerate the mainstreaming of digital assets in the traditional financial system.

🏛️Canada Announces Upcoming Stablecoin Legislation in Federal Budget

Key Highlights

• Canada announced in its 2025 federal budget plans to introduce stablecoin regulatory rules, requiring stablecoin issuers to hold sufficient reserves, establish redemption policies, implement risk management frameworks, and protect personal information;
• The Bank of Canada will set aside CAD 10 million from its consolidated revenue fund in 2026–2027 to manage the new regulations, with annual administrative costs of about CAD 5 million to be covered by fees charged to regulated stablecoin issuers thereafter;
• The Canadian government also plans to amend the Retail Payment Activities Act to regulate payment service providers using stablecoins, ensuring appropriate stablecoin management policies and promoting safe innovation in digital assets.

Why It Matters

• The establishment of Canada’s stablecoin regulatory framework is the latest development in the global wave of stablecoin regulation following the US’s passage of the GENIUS Stablecoin Act in July. According to Bloomberg, Canadian Treasury officials have held intensive discussions with industry stakeholders and regulators on stablecoin regulation, focusing mainly on stablecoin classification and preventing capital outflows to USD-backed tokens. With the implementation of the EU’s MiCA regulation and similar efforts in Japan and South Korea, stablecoin regulation has become a global trend. As of November 4, the global stablecoin supply was about $291 billion, mainly dominated by USD stablecoins, and Standard Chartered estimates that up to $1 trillion could flow from emerging market bank deposits to US stablecoins by 2028.

Market Adoption

🌱Yellow Card Shuts Down Retail Business to Focus on B2B Stablecoin Infrastructure

Key Highlights

• Africa’s leading crypto company Yellow Card announced it will shut down its consumer-facing mobile app from January 1, 2026, shifting its focus to providing stablecoin infrastructure services for enterprise clients, including corporate payment channels, treasury management, and liquidity solutions;
• Founded nine years ago, Yellow Card currently operates in over 30 countries, has processed over $6 billion in transactions, and has more than 1 million retail users. This move reflects a strategic shift trend among crypto-native companies;
• Since its Series B round in 2022, the company has gradually transitioned to serving enterprises and has raised $85 million to date, making it one of the best-funded fintech startups in Africa.

Why It Matters

• With the stablecoin market reaching $300 billion and global regulatory frameworks becoming clearer, Yellow Card’s business transformation validates that the African B2C stablecoin market is not yet mature, and the real business opportunity lies in the B2B sector. Although retail stablecoin businesses have attracted significant funding, at this stage, enterprise payments, treasury management, and liquidity solutions are the sustainable profit models.

🌱Mastercard, Ripple, and Gemini Collaborate to Explore XRPL-Settled Card Transactions

Key Highlights

• Mastercard is working with Gemini and Ripple to explore settling fiat credit card transactions using the RLUSD stablecoin on the XRPL blockchain, which will be one of the first cases of a regulated US bank using a regulated stablecoin on a public blockchain to settle traditional card transactions;
• Gemini offers an XRP version of its credit card through WebBank, which also participates in this RLUSD settlement plan. Last month, Gemini also launched a "Solana version" credit card, offering up to 4% SOL token rewards;
• Mastercard continues to expand its partnerships in digital assets, having partnered with Chainlink in June to allow consumers to "directly purchase crypto on-chain" through secure fiat-to-crypto conversion.

Why It Matters

• This collaboration marks a deep integration between traditional payment giants and crypto companies, using stablecoins on public chains to settle daily fiat card transactions, setting a milestone for the application of blockchain settlement systems in large-scale traditional financial transactions. Many crypto platforms are seeking to increase transaction revenue and attract new customers by offering debit and credit cards for everyday shopping, and such collaborations involving regulated banks pave the way for mainstream adoption of stablecoins in compliant traditional financial infrastructure.

New Product Releases

👀Ripple Launches Digital Asset Prime Brokerage Service, Expands US Institutional Business

Key Highlights

• Ripple has officially launched a digital asset prime brokerage service for US institutional clients, marking an important step into broader financial services following its earlier acquisition of multi-asset prime broker Hidden Road this year;
• The new Ripple Prime platform supports OTC trading of dozens of major digital assets (including XRP and Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin) and integrates them with derivatives, swaps, fixed income, and FX products in a single service suite;
• US institutional clients can now conduct cross-collateralized trading of OTC spot, swaps, and CME futures and options on one platform, greatly enhancing the flexibility of digital asset portfolio management.

Why It Matters

• By acquiring Hidden Road and launching Prime services, Ripple not only integrates regulatory licenses and existing prime brokerage infrastructure but also marks a strategic deepening of its transformation from payment solutions to a comprehensive financial services provider. Ripple Prime, together with the company’s payment and custody services, forms a complete ecosystem, deeply integrating XRP and RLUSD stablecoins into these products to enhance liquidity and simplify settlement processes for institutional participants.

👀Latin American Crypto Exchange Ripio Launches Argentine Peso Stablecoin "wARS"

Key Highlights

• Latin American crypto exchange Ripio has launched the Argentine peso-pegged stablecoin wARS, now live on Ethereum, Coinbase’s Base, and World Chain blockchains. The platform, with over 25 million users, further expands its real-world asset tokenization strategy;
• wARS allows users to send and receive funds globally at any time without going through banks or converting to USD, launched against the backdrop of the Milei government reducing inflation from 292% last April to 31.8% now;
• Ripio plans to launch similar stablecoins for other Latin American currencies, which could eventually enable cross-border payments across the region in local currencies, avoiding the current widespread reliance on the USD or costly intermediaries.

Why It Matters

• In high-inflation countries such as Argentina and Brazil, stablecoins are already popular as inflation and strict currency controls drive people to seek more stable stores of value. The launch of Ripio’s wARS follows its earlier sovereign bond tokenization project and is a further expansion of the exchange’s strategy to bring real-world assets on-chain. This move marks innovation in the local currency stablecoin field in Latin America, providing local users with new options to hedge against inflation and facilitate cross-border payments, while promoting the practical application and development of blockchain payment infrastructure in emerging markets.

👀Chainlink Launches CRE Platform to Accelerate Institutional Asset Tokenization

Key Highlights

• Chainlink has launched the Chainlink Runtime Environment (CRE), a software platform that allows institutions to deploy smart contracts on public and private chains, with built-in compliance, privacy, and data integration tools;
• CRE enables developers to write smart contracts that work across blockchains and connect to traditional financial messaging standards such as ISO 20022, while providing Chainlink’s existing services such as price feeds and proof-of-reserves systems;
• Major institutions including JPMorgan Kinexys, Ondo, UBS Tokenize, and DigiFT have already used the platform. For example, JPMorgan completed cross-chain settlement based on CRE, and UBS achieved the first on-chain tokenized fund redemption.

Why It Matters

• Chainlink positions CRE as the infrastructure for the tokenization transformation, noting that major institutions including Swift, Euroclear, UBS, and Mastercard are adopting it "to capture the $867 billion tokenization opportunity." According to Chainlink co-founder Sergey Nazarov, advanced institutional smart contracts previously took months or even years to implement correctly, but the launch of CRE reduces this to weeks or even days. The platform plans to add privacy features in early 2026, including confidential computing for institutions needing to securely handle proprietary data.

Macro Trends

🔮Stablecoin Issuers Dominate Crypto Yields, Accounting for Up to 75% of Protocol Daily Revenue

Key Highlights

• Stablecoin issuers continue to dominate crypto protocol revenue, accounting for 60%-75% of daily revenue in major crypto categories, far surpassing lending platforms, decentralized exchanges, etc.;
• Tether’s CEO announced the company is expected to achieve $15 billion in profit this year, with a profit margin of 99%, making it one of the world’s most efficient and profitable companies;
• Competition in the stablecoin industry is intensifying, with USDe becoming the third largest stablecoin and Coinbase beginning to offer 3.85% APY rewards to USDC holders.

Why It Matters

• The stablecoin business model relies on asset reserve yields, but increasing competition is prompting issuers to explore alternative value-sharing mechanisms, which could reshape the industry’s profit distribution model.

🔮Data: Crypto Card Transaction Volume Rose to $376 Million in October, Rain Cards Leads the Market

Key Highlights

• In October, total crypto card transaction volume grew from $318 million to $376 million, an increase of nearly 18%, indicating continued expansion in the crypto payments sector;
• Rain Cards led the market with $196 million in transaction volume, followed by RedotPay ($100 million) and Etherfi Cash ($33 million);
• The fastest-growing projects include Rain Cards (+$50 million), Etherfi Cash (+$9 million), Cypher (+$3 million), KoloHub (+$2 million), and MetaMask (+$400,000).

Why It Matters

• The rapid growth of the crypto card market shows that digital assets are gradually being integrated into everyday payment scenarios, providing an important channel for the practical application of cryptocurrencies and promoting the integration of the crypto economy with the traditional financial system.