Stablecoins In The Wild: When Fintech Discovers Programmable Money

What Happened

This article is authored by Arthur Firstov, the Chief Business Officer at Mercuryo, a global leader in crypto payments infrastructure. Arthur is a recognized voice on stablecoins, digital banking, and the convergence of web3 and traditional finance – and this article is based on his insights from partnerships with more than 300 companies, including Circle, Coinbase, Mastercard, Revolut, and Polymarket.

In late 2025, Swedish digital bank Klarna, best known for its “buy now, pay later” services, announced KlarnaUSD, its first U.S.-dollar stablecoin, built on Tempo, a new payments-focused blockchain developed by Stripe and Paradigm.

KlarnaUSD is issued via Bridge’s Open Issuance platform (a Stripe company) and is currently live in test mode, with a full launch on Tempo’s mainnet planned for 2026. Klarna explicitly frames the move as a way to:

For Firstov, this kind of partnership is exactly what “closing the gap” looks like in practice:

“When a digital bank like Klarna launches a stablecoin on a dedicated payments blockchain, the story is no longer ‘crypto people sending tokens to each other.’ It is mainstream payment companies quietly rewriting their settlement stack on top of stablecoin rails.”

The macro numbers underline the shift. The global stablecoin supply has pushed past $300 billion, signaling that this is no longer a niche segment. Meanwhile, new research from Protocol Theory (in partnership with Mercuryo) shows that in the U.S. only 12 percent of adults feel web3 wallets fit their lives, compared with 64 percent for traditional digital wallets. That gap highlights both the remaining friction and the size of the opportunity to make self-custodial experiences as intuitive as the apps people already use every day.

Market Context

As the digital assets market matures beyond speculation, a new phase of global finance is emerging, one defined by interoperability, compliance, and inclusion. Speaking at Token2049 Singapore 2025, Arthur Firstov outlined how the next evolution of financial systems is closing the gap between decentralized finance (DeFi) and traditional financial institutions.

The conversation focused on a simple idea with big implications: the worlds of crypto and mainstream finance are no longer parallel universes. They are converging to build accessible, efficient, and transparent global markets for both institutional and retail participants.

The data supports this trajectory. Recent research shows that stablecoin transfers for payments have already reached roughly $19.4 billion year-to-date in 2025 and are on pace to surpass $1 trillion annually by 2030, just for the emerging payments use cases, not speculative trading. At the same time, McKinsey now estimates that total stablecoin transaction volume across all use cases has already topped $27 trillion a year, putting it on a potential path to overtake legacy networks before the decade is out.

That growth highlights how quickly the narrative has shifted from “crypto trading” to “digital settlement rails.”

This variety of users reflects the growing diversity in access. In Latin America and Southeast Asia, where local currencies often face severe volatility, stablecoins are increasingly used as everyday banking alternatives rather than speculative assets.

Liquidity, Infrastructure and Market Movement

Why It Matters

One of the clearest signals that this shift is real comes from names that, until recently, had nothing to do with crypto.

Moves like KlarnaUSD on Tempo sit in the same category as PayPal’s PYUSD and other institution-led experiments: they are early, controlled, and compliance-heavy, but they reveal where the industry expects the real growth to come from.

Details

A Payment Layer for the Digital-Asset Era

“Stablecoins are becoming the new fintech,” says Firstov, who believes that in the next few years, every fintech company will, in effect, be a stablecoin company.

“In practice, the experience is seamless. Users can buy digital assets with a debit card or Apple Pay, convert them into stablecoins, send value globally in seconds, and cash out to a bank account,” Firstov explains.

Behind that simplicity is an expanding network of wallets, fintechs, and global payment rails working together to power instant, borderless transfers, the foundation of a new digital-asset settlement layer for the modern economy.

From Skepticism to Scale: Klarna, Tempo and the New Rails

– Bypass expensive, slow cross-border payment routes– Tap into a $120 billion annual cross-border fee pool– Serve over 100 million existing customers on cheaper, programmable rails

Who Is Using It and Why

“The digital-assets audience usually consists of blockchain enthusiasts and developers driving innovation in the space,” Firstov says.

But he adds that the user base now extends far beyond tech insiders:

– Digital nomads managing income across borders– People with families abroad sending remittances– Aspiring founders and freelancers getting paid globally– More sophisticated users exploring new digital-asset products and yield opportunities