Distribution & Revenue-Share Partners

Coinbase Global CEO Brian Armstrong said Citigroup has partnered with Coinbase to enable stablecoin payments for large institutional clients, calling the tie-up proof the crypto giant "has come a long way" since 2012. Under the partnership, Citi's institutional clients, including multinational corporations, will be able to accept stablecoin payments from customers at checkout through the bank's merchant-processing services, while Coinbase customers can use Citi's banking capabilities and automatically convert incoming cash into stablecoins. Armstrong recalled that getting a bank to work with Coinbase at its founding was "nearly impossible," and thanked Citi for the arrangement. Stablecoins are a key and rapidly growing revenue component for Coinbase, which shares interest income on reserve assets backing USDC with Circle Internet Group and monetizes customer balances on its platform; USDC held in Coinbase products hit an all-time high of $20 billion in the second quarter, more than 30% of all USDC in circulation. Coinbase shares finished Friday down 3.32% at $183.

The OUSD stablecoin has officially gone live with Visa, Mastercard and Stripe behind it, according to Scott Melker on "The Daily Wolf with Scott Melker." OUSD, or Open USD, is a consortium of fintechs and payment companies launching their own stablecoin to compete in a massive market where high interest rates generate essentially free money, and it is being run by Stripe, which acquired Bridge in a unicorn deal and whose Bridge CEO is also running the blockchain. The stablecoin is launching on multiple blockchains, including Ethereum, Solana, Base and Tempo, with the bulk of liquidity expected on Stripe's own Tempo blockchain, while reserves will be held at BlackRock, BNY and Lead Bank. Five founding members — Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe and Visa — will split the equity and have invested a billion dollars for initial liquidity, and depending on usage they will accrue more or less equity or earnings from the stablecoin, meaning earnings accrue to the companies promoting and using it rather than to a private company behind it. The launch follows a huge debate when it was announced, as 140 logos appeared including BlackRock and others, and some companies said they had never heard of it and had not gotten the memo.

Coinbase Global and Citi announced new fiat and stablecoin interoperability features linking Citi's banking rails with Coinbase infrastructure. Citi's Virtual Account Wallet for Coinbase will automatically convert client fiat balances into stablecoins and convert incoming stablecoins back into fiat. Merchants using Citi's Spring platform will be able to accept stablecoin payments while keeping settlement within Citi's regulated banking system. The Citi Virtual Account Wallet and Spring stablecoin rollout gives only a first glimpse of how far this Coinbase bank bridge could reach. The partnership plugs Coinbase's stablecoin and payments stack directly into a large commercial bank's cash management and merchant platforms, supporting Coinbase Global's effort to lean more on subscription style and service revenue rather than depending only on trading activity and market volumes.

SoFi Technologies has begun migrating its full debit and credit card program to stablecoin settlement using SoFiUSD across Mastercard's network, a live card program expected to handle more than $25 billion in annualized volume. SoFi Bank has already moved transactions onto blockchain rails, and merchants do not need to hold stablecoins or build new infrastructure to participate. Payward will join the SoFi Exchange Network, list SoFiUSD on Kraken and use SoFi's Big Business Banking capabilities, while SoFi will use Kraken Prime for digital-asset liquidity. In the second quarter, management said roughly $300 million of SoFiUSD was in circulation, and second-quarter adjusted net revenues rose 40% year over year to $1.2 billion, with adjusted EBITDA of $358 million at a 30% margin and fee-based revenues of $472 million. Management lifted 2026 adjusted net revenue guidance to $4.75 billion-$4.85 billion while maintaining about $1.6 billion of adjusted EBITDA, and consensus estimates point to 2026 and 2027 EPS increases of 53.85% and 35.91%, respectively. SoFi shares have fallen 36.7% year to date as of Sept. 25, 2026, compared with a 5.7% decline for PayPal and a 17.4% gain for Block, and SOFI trades at a forward 12-month price-to-sales multiple of 3.83X versus 1.32X for PayPal and 1.63X for Block; SOFI carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

U.S. financial giant Citi and U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase announced on the 28th that they will expand their collaboration in the payments business. The expanded partnership has two main pillars. The first is that Coinbase will use Citi's Banking-as-a-Service offering to provide "virtual accounts," with a key feature being the ability to automatically convert deposited fiat currency into stablecoins. The second is an initiative to enable Citi's customers to accept stablecoin payments through its payment acceptance platform Spring by Citi, with Coinbase's payment services supporting this and making it possible to automatically convert digital currency into fiat currency under Citi's payments. Ashish Bajaj, head of Citi's North America services division, commented that the goal is to build next-generation payment infrastructure that can seamlessly interoperate across both traditional and digital-era payment methods and payment networks. The collaboration announced this time is planned to be implemented first in the United States, and the two companies said they intend to roll out new features over the coming months.

SoFi Technologies and Mastercard launched live stablecoin settlement across SoFi Bank's debit and credit card program on September 22, with SoFi migrating its entire $25 billion card program to blockchain-based settlement on Mastercard's global payment network. The settlement is powered by SoFiUSD, the first stablecoin issued by a nationally chartered bank, and the companies say the initiative bridges traditional payment rails and digital asset networks to offer card issuers, acquirers, and merchants optimized liquidity management. SoFi reported record adjusted net revenue of $1.2 billion in Q2 2026, up 40% year-over-year, added 1.1 million members to reach 15.8 million total members, and saw interchange revenue jump 55% year-over-year on $28 billion in annualized card spend. Mastercard posted $2.9 trillion in Q2 gross dollar volume, $1.86 billion in Value-Added Services and Solutions revenue, up 20%, and $4.4 billion in Q2 net income. The article also flags execution risks, noting SoFi's $14.8 billion in Q2 loan originations and $156.6 million in Q2 GAAP net income, and Mastercard's 22% year-over-year rise in payment network rebates and incentives alongside an 11% increase in adjusted operating expenses.

US Senator Steve Daines, a member of the Senate Finance Committee, circulated a draft bill this week to stakeholders that would comprehensively overhaul the taxation of crypto assets, with formal introduction expected next week. The draft comprises 13 sections and includes tax relief for certain stablecoin payments and network fees of $10 or less, the application of wash-sale rules to crypto assets, and a system allowing businesses to elect mark-to-market taxation. Prior to this move, the US House of Representatives saw the introduction on September 14 of a comprehensive crypto tax bill, the Digital Asset Tax Certainty Act, which the House Ways and Means Committee approved on September 16 by a bipartisan vote of 38 to 5, but it is not scheduled for a floor vote in the House before the midterm elections, and further consideration is expected after the elections. Senator Daines plans to retire at the end of this term and has said he intends to lay out a framework for crypto taxation before leaving office.

Mastercard has switched on stablecoin settlement for SoFi Bank's debit and credit cards, using SoFiUSD across a reported $25b card program and tying blockchain-based assets directly into its existing global network. The launch adds to recent card partnerships and open finance integrations that feed into how the market weighs Mastercard's future growth potential against execution and regulatory risk. Mastercard's stock has a 90 day share price return of 13.75%, while the 30 day move is down 5.15%, and its total shareholder return stands at 45.96% over three years and 62.33% over five years. Against a last close of $567.65, the most followed narrative on Mastercard argues for a fair value of $750, a 24% undervalued view. On the other side of that narrative, Mastercard trades on 30.6x earnings, while the fair ratio sits at 21.5x, the US Diversified Financial industry at 17.3x, and direct peers around 48x.

The GENIUS Act's Section 4(a)(11), enacted in July 2025, now explicitly bars permitted stablecoin issuers from paying holders any interest or yield tied to holding tokens, locking in a business model built on reserve income the issuers keep entirely. Tether, issuer of USDT, ranks as the 17th-largest holder of US Treasuries globally with approximately $141 billion in direct and indirect Treasury exposure as of Q1 2026, per its BDO Italia attestation, while Morgan Stanley projects stablecoin issuers could collectively hold $1.2 trillion in US Treasuries by 2030. Circle's FY2025 SEC 10-K showed $2.75 billion in total revenue, of which $2.64 billion, or 96%, came from reserve income, yet the company still posted a $70 million net loss as distribution costs reached $1.66 billion, including approximately $1.36 billion to Coinbase and a $152.1 million increase attributable to Binance. Tether, lacking a partner on Coinbase's scale, retains roughly 3.0 to 3.5 cents per dollar annually versus Circle's 0.8 to 1.0 cents, posting $13 billion in net profit in 2024 and $1.04 billion in Q1 2026 with excess reserves of $8.23 billion. In September 2026 Circle sold $100 million in equity to Binance, 1,237,011 Class A shares at $80.84 per share, a 5% discount, alongside a five-year agreement paying Binance a monthly incentive fee on USDC held through Circle's Modular Smart Contract Wallet infrastructure, as the January 18, 2027 enforcement cliff approaches with Tether holding roughly 60% market dominance and Circle at 24%.

Binance has bought roughly 1.24 million Class A shares of Circle at $80.84 per share, for a total value of about $100 million, a price roughly 5% below the market level before the deal closed. Binance will be unable to sell or hedge this block of shares for up to two years, but it retains normal shareholder voting rights. The deal is more than an investment: the two sides signed a five-year agreement to drive USDC usage across Binance's global platforms, especially in emerging markets. Binance will help push adoption of USDC, while Circle will handle the underlying infrastructure. Under the agreement, Circle will pay Binance a monthly incentive fee calculated from the volume of USDC held through Circle's wallet infrastructure. USDC is currently the world's second-largest stablecoin, with a market value of about $75 billion, while Binance has a vast global user base, giving Circle a distribution channel and giving Binance both a stake in Circle and revenue from the partnership. It underscores that competition in the stablecoin market is no longer measured by the size of a coin alone, but by which one has the most channels for people to actually use it.

The Trump administration is considering a plan to promote overseas use of dollar-denominated stablecoins through joint ventures with private companies, Bloomberg reported on September 23. The aim is to shore up the dollar's status as the world's reserve currency and boost demand for US Treasuries. The backdrop is the GENIUS Act, enacted in July 2025, which established a federal regulatory framework for payment stablecoins and required issuers to hold one-to-one backing in US dollars or short-term Treasuries. The US Treasury published proposed rules on August 17 to implement the law and opened a public comment period, with the law scheduled to take effect on January 18, 2027. According to the Treasury, stablecoin issuers already hold about 200 billion dollars' worth of US Treasuries and short-dated government securities. The plan is said to involve the Treasury, the State Department, and the US International Development Finance Corporation, but it remains under consideration, and the target countries, partner companies, funding scale, and timing have not been disclosed.

Banks risk losing $230 billion in payments revenue as stablecoins, tokenized deposits and central bank digital currencies move from experimentation to commercialization, according to the Capgemini Research Institute's World Payments Report 2027. The report projects these instruments will account for approximately 4% of global payments volume by 2030, eroding high-margin revenue streams such as foreign exchange spreads, correspondent banking, float income and transaction processing fees. Widespread adoption could unlock as much as USD 4 trillion currently trapped in settlement and liquidity accounts, while nearly 60% of corporate clients say they are willing to source stablecoin services from non-bank providers if their banking partners fail to keep pace. Banks identify tokenized deposits as their top near-term priority, yet only 21% of banks, classified as leaders, are actively scaling at least one accelerated intelligent money instrument, while the remaining 79% are still evaluating their position. Jeroen Hölscher, Global Head of Payment Services at Capgemini, said the industry is entering its most significant period of disruption since the emergence of digital banking, and that with $230 billion at stake banks must decide what role they want to play in the emerging ecosystem.

Meta assembled the first integrated agent-commerce stack, letting its Muse agent move from product discovery to completed payment without a human touching checkout. On September 8, 2026, Meta launched Muse with Stripe's Link wallet for agents built in, enabling checkout at more than a million businesses that accept Link, with Link generating a single-use virtual card for other merchants; Muse is the first AI agent covered by Link's purchase protections. Shop Pay arrived on September 21, when Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke and Meta's Alexandr Wang announced a deep partnership enabling Shop Pay checkout across all Shopify stores and adding Meta as an AI channel inside Shopify's Agentic Storefronts. A day later, PayPal confirmed global payments across its worldwide merchant network, with Mastercard's Agent Pay platform providing the secure payment rails, and PayPal's stock rose nearly 5 percent on the news. By Mark Zuckerberg's September 23 Meta Connect keynote, the pipeline was live with Stripe, Shop Pay, PayPal, Expedia for travel and Instacart for groceries; Keybanc analysts raised Meta's price target to $900, calling it Muse's moment, and Muse hit number one in Apple's US App Store. Each Muse user gets a dedicated Muse Secure VM, an isolated Linux virtual machine with its own browser, where a separate Sentinel agent approves internet access and sensitive actions, credentials stay in vaults the agent cannot read, and every action generates an audit trail, with a Muse Confidential VM planned later in 2026. Amazon has blocked Muse from shopping on its site, while Muse remains US-only at launch with no global expansion timeline specified and full Shop Pay rollout details undisclosed.

Visa announced on September 23 that, in a survey of U.S. consumers on international money transfers, intent to use stablecoins would rise from 36% to 56% if fraud protections and deposit insurance equivalent to those of banks were provided. The survey, part of Visa's "Money Travels 2026," was conducted by Morning Consult from February 24 to March 2 among 2,192 U.S. adults, with respondents given definitions of key terms such as stablecoins before being questioned. Sixty-four percent said that when it comes to trusting new payment methods, they place more importance on who provides the service than on the technology itself, and intent to use stablecoins rose from 36% to 45% when they were offered through existing financial services providers. Among providers of digital currency services, trust was high in traditional commercial banks and global payment networks, at 61% and 60% respectively. Awareness, meanwhile, remains a challenge: 56% of respondents said they had never heard of stablecoins, and even among those aware of them, some mistakenly believed they were subject to price fluctuations like Bitcoin. Regarding fraud in international money transfers, 36% said they had encountered it, 24% had received AI-generated messages that looked genuine, and 44% were concerned about AI deepfakes impersonating family members. The question assuming bank-level protections was hypothetical, and stablecoins themselves are not covered by deposit insurance from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.

Visa has partnered with Reap to bring stablecoin-linked credit card programs to more than 100 markets, letting businesses fund card spending with stablecoins while merchants continue to accept Visa payments. Reap will handle card processing, compliance and day-to-day operations, and already settles its Asia-Pacific obligations with Visa directly in stablecoins. The two companies also plan to explore payments made by AI agents within limits set by users, though that work remains an exploration rather than a launched product. Visa shares edged up about 0.3% to $362.95 Wednesday morning on the news. The announcement offers no forecast for card spending or additional Visa revenue, leaving the test as whether the programs bring meaningful payment volume onto Visa's network.

BlackRock predicts agentic AI could become an underappreciated source of demand for digital assets, arguing in a September report titled The Machine-Native Economy that AI agents transacting independently will need machine-native payment rails built on stablecoins, native cryptocurrencies and other onchain assets. The asset manager said existing systems such as card networks and ACH can be less suited to always-on, low-value and programmable transactions, and cited Bitcoin Policy Institute simulations in which AI models generally favored stablecoins for everyday payments and Bitcoin for long-term value preservation, while cautioning the findings reflect simulated rather than actual agent behavior. The thesis is meeting real-world experimentation: Meta and PayPal announced on Sept. 22 that users will be able to shop and check out with Meta's Muse AI agent across PayPal's merchant network worldwide. Muse, launched Sept. 8, can book travel, fill out forms and make purchases after user approval, and quickly rose to the top of Apple's App Store rankings among free apps. PayPal also operates PayPal USD, its dollar-backed stablecoin, which became available across 70 markets in March, though neither company has said PYUSD will be used for Muse purchases. The news comes as Bitcoin climbed above $86,000 this week, its highest level in eight months, up about 8.8% in September after gaining roughly 25% in August, with Ether, XRP and other major altcoins also strengthening.

Bitcoin ETFs took in $1.7 billion in inflows over a strong two-day run. The figure was highlighted in the latest episode of the Daily Wolf, where Scott Melker also discussed a new stablecoin partnership involving Mastercard and SoFi. Melker further noted that Binance is investing $100 million into Circle's global USDC expansion. No further details on the ETF flows or the partnership terms were provided.

Roundtable, trading on Nasdaq as RTB, announced that its DeFi and AI reporting and payment platform is now live, settling advertising payments in real time with USDC through smart wallets linked to journalists' Coinbase accounts. The platform is integrated with Roundtable's Media Liquidity Pool and combines Coinbase's USDC payment infrastructure with RTB's enterprise Web3 mediaOS and AI-driven smart wallet system, requiring no human intermediary. Roundtable recently announced a ten-year contract to migrate 21 major media brands, hundreds of journalists, and nearly 100 million viewers consuming $100 million in advertising from a Web1 platform with manual fiat payments that can take 90 days or more onto its Web3, AI-driven Media OS and DeFi payment platform. The platform is already live in the U.S. with hundreds of journalists and tracks and clears trillions of AI-monitored bids through dynamic DeFi smart wallets. Following the North American announcement, the integration is being unveiled to the British press this week, led by former UK Prime Minister Liz Truss, who joined Roundtable's Board of Directors on September 18th, with CEO James Heckman offering major media brands the platform at no cost as part of a premium media coalition for European press. RTB's Nasdaq-listed shares began trading on Coinbase as of today's opening.

Visa has joined the founding validator cohort for Circle's Arc L1 blockchain, moving the payments giant from routing stablecoin traffic to helping secure the network itself. The cohort includes BlackRock, DTCC, Mastercard, and ICE. Visa's stablecoin settlement volume rose from a $3.5 billion annualized run rate in November 2025 to $7 billion by April 2026 and to an annualized $20 billion by September, a 15x year-over-year increase. Visa runs a dual-chain strategy: Solana remains the primary venue for production settlement with partners Cross River Bank and Lead Bank on a seven-day cycle, while Arc L1, which launched its mainnet on September 16, 2026, is a permissioned, USDC-native environment built for financial markets and agentic AI economic activity. Rubail Birwadker, Visa's Global Head of Growth Products and Strategic Partnerships, said Arc represents the compliant, high-trust network infrastructure needed to support onchain payments growth, and Circle Chief Product and Technology Officer Nikhil Chandhok said the work reflects growing demand for USDC and settlement infrastructure. The build-out comes ahead of the GENIUS Act enforcement cliff on January 18, 2027, after federal agencies missed the July 2026 rulemaking deadline, and as Visa expands to over 160 card programs in more than 50 countries.

Mastercard, Flybits and Rogers Bank announced Canada's first successful deployment of a landmark agentic commerce transaction involving an AI-powered commerce platform, a card issuer and a payments network. The milestone, issued by Mastercard Canada over PR Newswire, builds on Mastercard's global Agent Pay framework for trusted, interoperable and secure agentic commerce. As part of the initiative, a Flybits-powered AI assistant acted on instructions set by a Rogers Red credit card cardholder to identify an eligible product within the specified budget and complete the purchase using Mastercard Agent Pay, operating within validated consumer instructions and predefined spending limits. New Mastercard research conducted in August 2026 among 2,000 Canadian adults found that 41% are open to using AI assistants to help them shop online, and 53% of those with positive feelings toward AI shopping assistants are open to AI-assisted purchasing within pre-set preferences and budget limits. Craig Reiff, Senior Vice President, Core Payments, Mastercard, Canada, said trust will determine how quickly these experiences scale, while Rogers Bank CEO Nick Bednarz said the collaboration shows how AI technology can simplify commerce while preserving the security, transparency and control consumers expect. Flybits provided the agentic intelligence and explainability layer, and in future phases plans to incorporate Mastercard Insight Tokens, a secure and governed way for AI agents to access and apply permissioned insights with consumer consent.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency granted preliminary conditional approval for national trust bank charters to Bastion Platforms, Catena Trust Bank, and Agora National Trust Bank on September 18, 2026, issued as three distinct corporate decisions numbered 1391, 1392, and 1393. Bastion's approval is a conversion from a New York state trust company charter it has held since February 2025, while Catena Trust Bank and Agora National Trust Bank are de novo applications. Bastion does not issue its own stablecoins; it builds the technology, operations, and compliance stack that other regulated issuers use to run stablecoin programs, and Sony Bank's global stablecoin initiative runs on Bastion, whose $14.6 million round in September 2025 was backed by Coinbase Ventures, Sony, Samsung, a16z crypto, and NTT DOCOMO Ventures. The approvals cover fiduciary custody of USDC and other GENIUS Act-compliant assets, white-label stablecoin issuance and redemption, and payment infrastructure, with conditions requiring Bastion to limit operations to trust-company activities, conform stablecoin operations to the GENIUS Act, give 60 days' written notice before significant deviations from the business plan, and complete the conversion within six months or the approval expires. The batch brings at least 12 conditional approvals in 2026 alone, following roughly 48 digital-asset bank charter applications over the 14 years between 2011 and 2024, a shift that followed the OCC's April 2026 amendment to 12 CFR 5.20 and precedes the GENIUS Act enforcement cliff on January 18, 2027.

Coinbase Global reported that its agentic trading stack powered most crypto transaction flows over the past week. Management highlighted Grok as a leading AI agent on the platform, driving a large share of AI agent-driven trading volumes, while developer-built custom interfaces using Coinbase for Agents and the x402 payment protocol accounted for the majority of notional market activity. The company said the shift toward agentic trading moves it closer to a model leaning on higher margin services rather than pure retail volumes, with Grok and custom agents plugging into a payment stack built around USDC, Base and APIs. Coinbase added that heavier machine-driven flows do not remove existing risks around fee pressure, cybersecurity costs or competition from decentralized venues. The key proof point ahead is whether upcoming disclosures break out AI agent related metrics, such as the share of notional trading or fee revenue routed through Coinbase for Agents and x402, in the next couple of quarterly updates and product briefings.

Europe has moved agentic payments into live production while the United States remains stalled over who bears the loss when an AI agent errs. Live end-to-end payments have been executed by Santander, Mastercard, ING, and Worldline, and on July 2, 2026, ING, Worldline, and Visa completed an agentic payment in Germany using Visa Payment Passkeys for biometric authentication. Mastercard has enabled all issuers in Europe at the network level for Agent Pay, backed by a new Lisbon Centre of Excellence for Innovation, with Mastercard Europe President Kelly Devine calling agentic payments a profound shift in how commerce is initiated and executed. In the US, the Treasury OIG has flagged ambiguity in Regulation E on agent authorization, and the AI AGENT Act introduced in July 2026 addresses fiduciary duties rather than liability allocation for agent misexecution, prompting the Consumer Bankers Association to recommend the industry write its own private network rules. Hypertrade data shows a 4,700% year-over-year increase in AI-generated traffic to retail sites, yet agentic commerce is less than 1% of US e-commerce, with only 23% of US consumers trusting generative AI to handle payment transactions and 93% of merchants saying the AI provider should bear the financial loss for incorrect purchases.