Every month, we’re diving deep into the state of stablecoins. There’s a lot going on here and no single source of truth for people to stay up to date. So we’re sharing the biggest developments and use cases as well as what’s happening onchain – all in one place.
New here? Subscribe to get updates straight to your inbox.
Top Stablecoin Stats
Total market cap: $297.68B (-0.62%)
Monthly transfer volume: $5.79T (-40.1%)
Monthly active addresses: 53.0M (-7.12%)
Total holders: 261.35M (+5.86%)
USDT: $188.23B (-0.41%)
USDC: $70.67B (-4.81%)
USDS: $8.17B (+4.21%)
USD1: $4.75B (+4.86%)
USDe: $4.49B (+15.13%)
The metrics are accurate at the time of publication. The percentage change is over a 30-day period.
What Caught Our Eye
The Digital Asset Market Clarity Act in May cleared the Senate Banking Committee, passing with a 15-9 bipartisan vote. The latest draft of the Act sharpens the bill’s stablecoin provision by preventing crypto firms from offering stablecoin yields on idle balances — a key point of contention between banks and the crypto industry. The Act still has to clear the Senate and House of Representatives, and be signed by President Donald Trump.
Coinbase has agreed to acquire the brand assets of Hyperliquid’s native stablecoin USDH, from its issuer Native Markets. Additionally, Coinbase made USDC the Aligned Quote Asset (AQA) of Hyperliquid, meaning it shares yield revenue with Hyperliquid in exchange for special trading incentives for Hyperliquid’s users. USDH will be retired over time, and users will be able to freely convert their USDH to USDC. The move expands USDC’s dominance on Hyperliquid, which has roughly doubled its supply on the platform year-over-year.
The European Commission has reopened its landmark MiCA framework for review, and has opened a consultation through August 31 to investigate whether the rules fit the evolving crypto market. The worry from European regulators is that the current framework makes euro-backed stablecoins less competitive than ones backed by the dollar. As the EU’s executive arm weighs the changes, the bank-led Qivalis Consortium has rallied 37 lenders, including BNP Paribas, ING and UniCredit, behind a euro-pegged stablecoin, underscoring the growing urgency in Europe to build a homegrown alternative to the already dominant dollar-denominated stablecoins.
Amazon Web Services early in May launched a feature to its Bedrock AgentCore platform that lets AI agents autonomously pay for APIs, data, and content. The feature lets AI agents that run on Bedrock make payments via the open-source x402 protocol, enabling instant stablecoin micropayments.
Quote of the Month:
“Despite [the fact] that we are using them in the US and Europe, stablecoins were not made for us. Stablecoins are a technology that was made to allow people in third world countries and developing countries to access the biggest economy on the planet, which is the US dollar… Stablecoins are freedom in the form of code. They effectively allow all those people that are literally wasting 40% of their net worth every year against inflation by living in Congo, in Rwanda, and in all those places to have an edge against that inflation. It doesn't look like much to us… but for somebody that is selling goods on the street in Tanzania, having the ability to go from M-Pesa to a US dollar is extremely powerful”
Listen to the full episode here to learn more about the agentic payments stack and the roadblocks standing in the way of agentic commerce.
A Chart Worth Checking Out
Average daily stablecoin transfer volumes declined throughout May, falling 36.6% to $212.71 billion per day in May from $334.94 billion per day in April.
Broken down by chain, Base saw the largest declines, with average volumes falling 56% to $74.62 billion, followed by Optimism which saw volumes plummet 48% decrease to $6.06 billion. Solana, meanwhile, saw volumes decline 38.7% to $21.65 billion per day.
The declines came as the effects of rising oil prices, high interest rates and geopolitical instability increasingly turn investors away from risky assets such as stablecoins.
Bitcoin prices are down 15.9% from the beginning of the year, which, combined with the regulatory uncertainty around the GENIUS and CLARITY Acts, has led to a decrease in swap volumes as investors prefer to wait and see how things shake out.
However, even as transfer volumes fell, other stablecoin metrics remained strong: total holders were up 6% to 259.6 million, and market cap held roughly flat at $299.65 billion.
10 Stablecoin Developments In May
Western Union has launched USDPT, a USD-backed stablecoin issued by Anchorage Digital Bank and built on Solana. Western Union also announced several new services meant to support the stablecoin, including global exchange support for USDPT, a digital asset network, a consumer spending platform called Stable, and treasury and agent settlement.
Celo went live on Bridge, Stripe’s stablecoin platform, giving developers access to onramps, offramps, and cross-chain USDC transfers.
Circle unveiled the Circle Agent Stack, a chain-agnostic set of tools that lets AI agents hold USDC and make payments autonomously. The tools, which include agent wallets, a service marketplace and a command line interface, provide additional utility to USDC, which already accounts for 99.8% of the volume on the x402 agentic payments protocol.
Anchorage Digital partnered with M0 to pair M0’s modular stablecoin infrastructure with Anchorage’s issuance, custody and reserve management services. The partnership is geared towards fintechs and app developers, and aims to lower the time, cost and complexity of launching stablecoins.
Plasma One, Plasma’s stablecoin account and neobank, launched a number of new upgrades this month, including ACH and wire transfer integrations; the ability to fund user accounts from Base; and EUR accounts. Plasma is currently in beta testing, and a full release is expected this month.
Whop launched Whop Cards through stablecoin card issuer Rain, letting businesses and freelancers on the marketplace spend their balances anywhere Visa is accepted.
Paxos has secured SEC approval to set up a subsidiary, Paxos Securities Settlement Company, as a clearing agency. The unit will provide clearing and settlement services as a central securities depository in the U.S.
OSL Group and Anchorpoint completed test transfers of HKDAP, a Hong Kong dollar-backed stablecoin, on Ethereum Mainnet. The test comes ahead of the stablecoin’s official launch, scheduled for the end of Q2 2026.
Tether partnered with the Government of Georgia to launch GEL₮, a stablecoin representing the Georgian Lari. The initiative stands out because Georgia has built stablecoin rules for substantive compatibility with U.S. legislation like the GENIUS Act.
Want to learn more?
Ben Reynolds, SVP and head of Big Business Banking at SoFi, joined the Talking Tokens podcast to explain why his company launched the SoFi USD stablecoin on Solana, and explained how that the next wave of onchain payments will come from banks with built-in network effects rather than from crypto-native firms.
Read the Federal Reserve's FEDS Note on how banks have historically responded to disruptive financial innovations — from money market funds in the 1970s to PayPal and Venmo — and what those episodes suggest about whether stablecoins will erode banks’ deposit base or simply reshape how they compete.
This is the State of Stablecoins. May Edition.
Hit reply and let us know how we did! What was your favorite part of the newsletter? Our founder reads every response.
This product was built by StrataMedia.
This information is for entertainment purposes only. It should not be considered financial advice, nor should it be used to make investment decisions. Cryptocurrencies are high risk and you should consult a financial professional before making any financial decisions. Make sure you do your own research.
To get this newsletter delivered to your inbox, subscribe here.
