CryptoFinancialSolutionsRead the briefing

A briefing for traditional finance

The financial system is quietly changing.

For most people, "crypto" still means speculation. Underneath the headlines, a different story is playing out — a new layer of financial infrastructure that moves money faster, cheaper, and across the world. This is a plain-English tour of what's actually being built, and by whom.

Start with the use casesOr read the one-paragraph thesis →

§ The thesis

Banks, payment companies, fintechs and even governments are quietly adopting blockchain and stablecoin rails behind the scenes. The interesting story isn't crypto trading — it's that the plumbing of global finance is being upgraded, often invisibly, in front of us.

24/7
Settlement that doesn't sleep
T+0
Minutes, not days, between sender & receiver
1:1
Stablecoins backed by real reserves
API
Money that software can address directly
01Remittances & cross-border payments

Sending money across borders

  • Faster international payments
  • Lower fees end-to-end
  • Reach into thin banking corridors
  • Continuous global treasury movement

The old system

A dollar sent from New York to Lagos may pass through three or four correspondent banks, take several days, and shed fees at every hop.

The new approach

Stablecoins move digital dollars across the open internet, 24/7, settling in minutes instead of days — with the banking layer used only at the edges.

Firms building this

Circle

Issuer of USDC, a regulated digital dollar used widely for business settlement.

Ripple

Works with banks to use blockchain rails for cross-border transfers.

Stripe

Now embedding stablecoin rails inside its global internet payments stack.

02Merchant acceptance & checkout

Digital dollars for online payments

  • Lower processing costs
  • Near-instant settlement
  • Global commerce without FX desks
  • Always-on payments

The old system

Card networks involve issuers, acquirers, processors and schemes — each taking a slice, with settlement landing days later.

The new approach

Stablecoins act like internet-native dollars: a merchant can be paid and settled in near real time without waiting on banking hours.

Firms building this

Coinbase Commerce

Lets businesses accept stablecoin and crypto payments online.

BitPay

One of the earliest merchant processors for digital currency payments.

BVNK

Stablecoin payment infrastructure for globally operating businesses.

03Institutional settlement

Banks moving money more efficiently

  • Real-time interbank settlement
  • Lower operational cost
  • 24/7 treasury operations
  • Less counterparty friction

The old system

Wholesale settlement systems were designed decades ago and largely stop when banks close. Liquidity sits idle overnight and over weekends.

The new approach

Blockchain-based settlement lets institutions move value continuously. Think of it as upgrading the plumbing beneath the financial system.

Firms building this

JPMorgan Kinexys

JPMorgan's blockchain division focused on institutional settlement.

Fireblocks

Secure infrastructure for institutions moving and custodying digital assets.

Anchorage Digital

A federally chartered digital asset bank for institutional clients.

04T-bills, funds, real estate on-chain

Tokenizing real-world assets

  • Faster transactions & settlement
  • Fractional ownership made simple
  • Potentially deeper liquidity
  • Less administrative drag

The old system

Owning a slice of a Treasury fund or a building means paperwork, custodians, transfer agents and slow reconciliation.

The new approach

Tokenization represents that same ownership digitally on a blockchain — transferable, divisible and verifiable in seconds.

Firms building this

BlackRock

Exploring tokenized funds and on-chain investment infrastructure.

Ondo Finance

Bringing yield products like U.S. Treasuries onto blockchain networks.

Circle

Extending beyond stablecoins into broader digital financial infrastructure.

05Dollar access by smartphone

Financial services in emerging markets

  • Access to dollar savings
  • Easier participation in global trade
  • Financial access without legacy banks
  • Faster, cheaper remittances

The old system

In countries with high inflation or limited banking, holding savings or paying suppliers abroad is genuinely hard.

The new approach

A phone and a stablecoin wallet can offer dollar-denominated savings, payments and remittances without a local bank account.

Firms building this

Yellow Card

Expanding stablecoin access across African markets.

Bitso

Major Latin American platform powering crypto-based remittances and payments.

Coins.ph

Widely used digital wallet platform across Southeast Asia.

06Smart contracts as financial logic

Programmable money

  • Workflow automation
  • Fewer intermediaries
  • Lower paperwork burden
  • Auditable, deterministic execution

The old system

Traditional money is passive: it sits in an account until a human or a batch process moves it.

The new approach

On-chain money can carry its own rules. Funds release only when conditions are met — escrow, payroll, royalties, all without manual handling.

Firms building this

Ethereum

The leading platform for programmable financial applications.

Chainlink

Bridges real-world data into on-chain applications.

Aave

One of the largest decentralized lending protocols.

07Machine-to-machine commerce

AI + digital payments

  • Automated commerce
  • Machine-to-machine payments
  • Real-time programmable finance
  • Global digital coordination

The old system

Software agents have no native way to pay. Subscriptions, API limits and humans-in-the-loop fill the gap.

The new approach

As AI agents act on behalf of people and businesses, stablecoins and programmable rails give them a way to transact directly.

Firms building this

Stripe

Building internet-native payment infrastructure with stablecoin support.

Coinbase Developer Platform

APIs and tooling for programmable financial applications.

The bigger picture

Most people will use this infrastructure without realizing it.

You don't think about SMTP when you send an email, or TCP/IP when you load a website. In the same way, the rails being built today are designed to disappear into the background of global finance.

The conversation is no longer simply "crypto investing." It's about modernizing how money moves, settles, stores value, and interacts with software in a digital world — and which firms will be the AT&Ts and Visas of that next layer.