Thanks to new data revealed by VISA, over 90% of stablecoin transaction volumes aren’t coming from genuine users, Bloomberg reported.
VISA collaborated with Allium Labs on a dashboard developed to filter out transactions initiated by bots and large-scale traders, thereby focusing solely on transactions made by genuine individuals. Out of the approximately $2.2 trillion in total transactions recorded in April 2024, VISA reports that only $149 billion stemmed from ‘organic payments activity.’
Cuy Sheffield, Head of Crypto, VISA, pointed out that stablecoins transactions may frequently be double-counted depending on the platforms involved in fund transfers. For instance, converting $100 worth of Circle Internet Financial Ltd.’s USDC to PayPal’s PYUSD on the decentralized exchange Uniswap would lead to $200 of total stablecoin volume being recorded on-chain.
Despite the variance between total transfer volume and bot-adjusted transfer volume, the analysis revealed a consistent increase in monthly active stablecoin users. Across all chains, there were 27.5 million monthly active users, indicating a steady growth trajectory.
The stablecoin market supply currently stands at over $160 billion with:
- Tether (USDT) – 75% market share, and
- USD Coin (USDC) – 22% market share
dominating the market.
According to analysts at Bernstein, the total value of all stablecoins in circulation could soar to $2.8 trillion by 2028, marking an almost 18-fold surge from their current combined circulation. Due to the instantaneous and nearly cost-free nature of transactions facilitated by these tokens, many within the crypto industry argue that they are positioned to disrupt the payments sector.
“Stablecoins are still in a very nascent moment in their evolution as a payment instrument,” Pranav Sood, Executive General manager for EMEA at payments platform, Airwallex, said of the data.
“That’s not to say that they don’t have long-term potential, because I think they do. But the short-term and the mid-term focus needs to be on making sure that existing rails work much better.”
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