The continuing bear market did little to curb the rising use of stablecoins. Quite the opposite, dollar-pegged cash like USDT and USDC noticed a parabolic development in market cap this yr, changing into a defacto settlement forex of the crypto trade.
Following the collapse of Terra and its algorithmic stablecoin UST, the 2 stablecoin giants took over the vast majority of stablecoin volumes — they usually present no signal of stopping.
In response to information from CoinMetrics, over $7 trillion in worth has been settled with stablecoins in 2022. This can be a vital enhance from the $6 trillion settled in 2021 and the $1 trillion settled the yr earlier than.
Some analysts predict that the worth settled with stablecoins may attain as a lot as $9 trillion in 2023, second solely to Visa, which processes round $12 trillion in worth per yr. Others imagine their on-chain quantity will surpass not solely Visa but in addition the mixture quantity of all 4 main card networks — Visa, MasterCard, American Specific, and Uncover.
Nevertheless, even when the settlement worth stays flat subsequent yr, it would surpass virtually all the opposite massive settlement suppliers individually — together with Mastercard, American Specific, and Uncover.
Mastercard, the second-largest card issuer on this planet, processed round $2.2 trillion in worth to this point in 2022, falling manner behind the mixed settlement worth of the seven largest stablecoins. For instance, American Specific settled round $1 trillion in worth this yr, whereas Uncover settled lower than $200 billion in transactions.
