18/09/2026
💵 STABLECOINS MOVED ABOUT $35 TRILLION IN 2025.
⚠️ SO WHY ARE THEY STILL BARELY VISIBLE IN GLOBAL TRADE?
The numbers tell an interesting story.
Stablecoins are no longer a small experiment.
Around $35 trillion in stablecoin transactions were recorded in 2025.
Yet estimates suggest only around $390 billion represented actual payment-related flows.
Put that against an estimated ~$1 quadrillion annual cross-border payments market, and the gap becomes enormous.
So the technology exists.
The liquidity exists.
The transactions are already happening.
But real-world commercial adoption is still relatively small.
There are signs this may be changing.
Research by Artemis found B2B stablecoin payments running at approximately
$36 billion annually in early 2025 — up 315% year-on-year within its dataset.
And around 80% of stablecoin payment volume in that study was conducted using USDT.
So why hasn't international trade moved faster?
One reason may be that moving money and settling a trade are not the same thing.
A USD 10 million commodity transaction is not simply:
Buyer → $10M → Seller.
It can involve banks, KYC and AML checks, sanctions screening, documentary conditions, inspection, title transfer, credit risk and trade finance.
Stablecoins potentially solve one important part of that chain:
moving value across borders quickly and 24/7.
But they do not automatically solve everything surrounding the transaction.
And there is another interesting number:
Around 98% of stablecoin value is denominated in US dollars.
So stablecoins may not represent a move away from the dollar at all.
They could represent a new infrastructure for moving dollars.
The gap is therefore fascinating:
$35T in stablecoin activity.
~$390B in payment-related flows.
~$1 quadrillion in global cross-border payments.
The rails exist.
What is stopping international trade from using them at scale?
Regulation? Compliance? Banking integration? Counterparty risk? Or simply time?
What’s your view — would you settle a real international trade transaction in stablecoins?