Visa expands its stablecoin capability to include USDC issued on Solana

• Visa started venturing into USDC settlements back in 2021 through a partnership with Crypto.com.
• Crypto.com’s Australian card program’s cross-border volume was paid for using Ethereum-based USDC.
• Visa is now expanding its USDC settlements to include Solana issues USDC coins.

Visa has expanded its stablecoin settlement capabilities to merchant acquirers launching pilots with Worldpay and Nuvei using the Solana blockchain.

Visa has revealed that it is settling fiat-based payments by moving millions of USDC tokens between partners across the Ethereum and Solana blockchains in live and completed pilots with issuers and acquirers.

In a statement, the payments company described how its support of USDC has evolved from trial programs involving Crypto.com to integrations with Worldpay and Nuvei, two merchant payment processors.

USDC settlements using Visa

Visa and Crypto.com started experimenting with USDC in 2021 to explore stablecoin settlement on the issuing side. In the ensuing trial, Crypto.com’s Australian card program’s cross-border volume was paid for using Ethereum-based USDC.

Prior to the collaboration with Visa, settlements for international transactions done on Crypto.com, using Visa cards included lengthy currency conversion procedures and incurred wire transfer costs. However, after the successful USDC settlement trials, the cryptocurrency exchange now settles obligations for its Australian Visa cards using USDC.

Given that Solana and Ethereum-based USDC are now part of the Visa ecosystem, the former can use Visa’s treasury and settlement mechanisms to link traditional finance to Web3. Cuy Sheffield, the head of crypto at Visa, stated that using blockchains like Ethereum and Solana and stablecoins like the USDC can help increase the speed of cross-border settlements.

Visa can now transmit money to USDC merchant acquirers like Worldpay and Nuvei thanks to the integration of USDC, which is anticipated to shorten settlement periods for businesses that use their services. By integrating Visa’s traditional fiat ecosystem with stablecoins and the larger cryptocurrency space they serve, the payment processors are able to route USDC payments to the merchants they serve.

According to Jim Johnson, president of Worldpay Merchant Solutions, Visa’s USDC settlement capacity would allow it to give merchants more options for receiving money and more effectively manage its treasury operations.