How money actually moves around the world — from telegraphs to stablecoins — and who's competing to replace what
Moving money between countries today uses infrastructure designed in the 1970s. Here's how we got here — and what's trying to replace it.
The mail analogy: SWIFT is like the postal system — it delivers a letter (payment instruction) but someone else has to actually hand over the package (money). Fedwire is a bonded courier that only works 9-5 on weekdays. ACH is bulk mail — cheap but slow. Wise figured out you don't need to send mail at all if you have offices in both cities. Stablecoins are email — the message IS the money, it arrives instantly, and it works 24/7.
Circle isn't alone. Here's everyone fighting over the future of money movement.
Biggest stablecoin by far. Dominates in emerging markets — the de facto "digital dollar" in Asia, Latin America, Africa. Less regulated than USDC. Recently hired Big Four auditor (eroding Circle's transparency edge).
Fully audited by Deloitte. MiCA compliant in EU. OCC national trust bank charter. The "safe" stablecoin for regulated institutions. Faster onchain velocity than USDT (per JPMorgan). But much smaller market cap.
PayPal has 400+ million users who can buy/hold/send PYUSD in-app without knowing anything about crypto. Distribution advantage is massive. But adoption has been slow — most PayPal users don't care about stablecoins yet.
After years of pushing XRP (volatile), Ripple launched RLUSD — a proper stablecoin. Integrating with Fedwire via their Hidden Road acquisition. Targeting the same bank-to-bank corridor as CPN. Direct competitor to Circle's payments network.
Stripe acquired Bridge to build stablecoin payments. Bridge issues USDB — their own stablecoin. Stripe merchant accounts can hold USDC or USDB. If USDB scales, Stripe could route payments away from USDC entirely.
Major European banks forming a consortium to launch their own stablecoin. Motivated by MiCA regulation and desire to keep stablecoin profits in-house. Network effects work against them — USDT/USDC already dominant and hard to displace.
Tether owns emerging markets. Circle owns institutions. Everyone else is trying to take share from both. The question is whether stablecoins are a winner-take-most market (like Visa/Mastercard) or a fragmented one (like banks). Circle is betting on the former — but they're #2, not #1.
Here's the real question: if I send USDC to someone in Argentina, can they actually turn it into pesos and buy groceries? The answer depends on where you are.
Onramps: Coinbase, Circle Mint, any major exchange. Offramps: Coinbase → bank deposit in minutes. Stripe, Visa settlement. Circle Mint for institutions. Zero friction.
Onramps: Coinbase, Bitstamp, Kraken. Offramps: SEPA bank transfers from exchanges. Circle is MiCA-compliant — only major stablecoin that is. EURC growing fast (€310M). Regulated exchanges offer direct USDC→EUR.
Onramps: Mercado Bitcoin, Bitso, Binance Brazil. Offramps: Exchange → PIX (instant local payments). Brazil's central bank built PIX — so USDC→PIX is viable through local exchanges. Over 50% of crypto exchange purchases are stablecoins.
The irony: Argentina has capital controls that make it hard to buy real dollars. USDC IS the solution. 60% of Argentine crypto transactions are stablecoins. People use USDC as a savings account because the peso loses value constantly. Onramps: Bitso, Lemon Cash, Belo, Airtm, P2P exchanges. Offramps: Sell USDC for pesos on local exchanges at the "blue dollar" rate (closer to real market rate than official rate). Not seamless, but functional.
Nigeria is Africa's largest crypto market. Massive remittance corridor — $20B+/year flows in. Local exchanges (Quidax, Luno, Yellow Card) support USDC↔NGN. P2P markets are active. The central bank has been back-and-forth on crypto regulation, creating uncertainty.
India levies a 30% tax on crypto gains + 1% TDS on all transactions. This crushed local exchange volume. Largest remittance recipient in the world ($125B+/year). If regulation softens, stablecoins could transform India's remittance market. For now, mostly P2P and offshore exchanges.
Major remittance corridor (US → Philippines). Coins.ph is a leading exchange with USDC support and direct cash-out to local banks and e-wallets (GCash, Maya). Stablecoins are becoming a real alternative to Western Union for Filipino diaspora sending money home.
Crypto trading is banned. China is building its own CBDC (digital yuan). Tether is still widely used via P2P and offshore channels. USDC has almost no presence. Not a market Circle can easily access.
Not yet — but they're hiring for it. Wise recently posted a job for a "digital asset product lead" focused on stablecoins. They haven't launched USDC support, but the writing is on the wall. Today, Wise uses its own internal netting system (pools of local currency in each country). Adding stablecoins would let Wise cover corridors where they DON'T have local banking partners — exactly the markets where USDC is strongest.
The ATM analogy: Sending USDC is like having a global ATM card — your money is digital and moves instantly. But the question is: is there an ATM where you're going? In the US and EU, there's an ATM on every corner (Coinbase, exchanges, banks). In Argentina, there's a network of informal ATMs (P2P exchanges, local apps). In India, the government is putting locks on the ATMs. In China, they've demolished them all. The technology works. The last mile depends on local rails and regulation.
CPN doesn't require the end user to touch crypto. The OFI (originating bank) does the conversion in the US, and the BFI (beneficiary bank) does the conversion in Brazil or wherever. The consumer on both ends only sees fiat — dollars in, reais out. That's the whole point: stablecoins as invisible plumbing, not consumer products. The last-mile problem is solved by having licensed FIs in each country do the conversion.