Visa Flags Modest Stablecoin Uptake, Calls for Clear US Regulation

Visa has processed over $200 million in stablecoin settlements, but the payments giant says the technology is still in its infancy and awaits firmer regulatory guardrails before it can scale further.

“It’s still early, but we do see real potential,” CEO Ryan McInerney said Tuesday during Visa’s fiscal Q2 2025 earnings call. “On the one hand, $200 million is a great kind of milestone. On the other hand, it’s still a relatively small portion of our overall settlement volume.”

Visa posted strong financials for the quarter, reporting $10.17 billion in revenue, up 14% year-over-year, with adjusted net income rising to $5.83 billion, up from $4.91 billion the year prior.

The company’s shares closed at $351.29 on Tuesday, down 1.18% for the day, and slipped further to $343.06 in after-hours trading, an additional 2.34% decline.

Visa has been testing stablecoins through Visa Direct, focusing on real-time cross-border transfers where legacy settlement delays persist. 

It’s also building out programmability with the Visa Tokenized Asset Platform, “to help enable banks to issue and leverage stablecoins for new types of programmable finance,” McInerney said.

“We are optimistic about the U.S. government passing more clear and pragmatic regulations, I think not just in the U.S., but hopefully other countries as well,” McInerney said.

Stablecoins are cryptos typically pegged to the U.S. dollar, making them useful for payments and remittances while avoiding market volatility. The sector boasts a market capitalization of over $272.25 billion, according to CoinGecko.

“Data shows that only 10-20% of stablecoin transactions currently represent payment activity, while the rest are tied to trading and liquidity provisioning by crypto platforms,” Zakhil Suresh CMT, founder and CEO at crypto asset manager BitSave, told Decrypt. 

“However, this share is projected to rise above 50% in the next year as clearer regulations emerge and businesses increasingly adopt stablecoins for cross-border payments and payroll.”

The payment giant has made several strategic moves in the stablecoin space recently, including an investment in London-based stablecoin infrastructure company BVNK and a partnership with Bridge, a Stripe unit, to offer stablecoin services in Latin America.

“There’s a lot of activity and discussion about stablecoin [the] space right now,” McInerney added.

Others view the space as still nascent compared to Visa’s existing scale. 

“Visa’s $5-7 trillion daily volume dwarfs stablecoins’ $20-30 billion daily transactions. However, with $250 billion in stablecoin issuance, this space is still in its early stages, similar to e-commerce in the late 90s,” Jagdish Pandya, founder of Blockon Ventures, told Decrypt. 

“As digital assets become more regulated, Visa may witness massive adoption in the next decade,” Pandya said.

Earlier this month, President Trump signed the GENIUS Act, the country’s first major crypto legislation, into law.

“While the GENIUS Act provides clarity for businesses in the U.S., global payment processors like VISA will also need to stay watchful for regulatory developments in other countries,” BitSave’s Suresh added.