MARKET STRUCTURE
READ ANALYSIS →Stablecoin reserves and attestations: a practical reading guide
How to separate issuer disclosures, accountant attestations, reserve dates and redemption access, with examples from Circle, Paxos, Ripple and Aave.
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Original analysis on market structure, products, policy and adoption for operators and institutions.
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How to compare stablecoin cards: fees, funding and eligibility
A practical comparison method, with provider examples from MetaMask, Gnosis Pay and Rain. Start with eligibility and the full cost of spending, not cashback.
Stablecoin interoperability is an inventory problem.
A common ticker does not create a common pool of money. Operators still have to fund, route and reconcile chain-specific balances under different failure conditions.
Agent payments need bounded authority.
A wallet proves that software can sign. A production payment system must also prove who delegated the purchase, under which constraints, and what happened afterward.
Distribution agreements are becoming the stablecoin business model.
Reserve income may begin with the issuer, but wallets, exchanges and payment platforms increasingly negotiate for the economics created by the balances they distribute.
How stablecoin cards work: from wallet funding to merchant settlement
The card face hides an issuer, processor, program manager, wallet, liquidity path and settlement model. Product quality depends on how those dependencies behave together.
24/7 settlement does not remove working capital.
Stablecoins extend transfer availability, but an end-to-end payment still depends on inventory, redemption, banking rails and the timing mismatch between its legs.
Stablecoin regulation is becoming operational control design.
Issuer eligibility, reserve rules, redemption disclosures and financial-crime obligations must be translated into owned systems and evidence, not reduced to a compliance badge.
A stablecoin card payment is usually not an onchain merchant payment.
The consumer may fund from a stablecoin balance while authorization, clearing, merchant acceptance and disputes continue through a conventional card network.