Fortune published a report that several Big Tech firms, including Apple, X, Airbnb and Google, are exploring using stablecoins for payments, citing sources. A month ago the same magazine reported that Meta was exploring digital currencies. The news follows Uber’s confirmation yesterday that it was investigating the potential for stablecoin payments.
“We’re still in the study phase I’d say. For me, stablecoins are one of the more interesting instantiations of crypto,” Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshani told Bloomberg yesterday. “I do think stablecoins are quite promising, especially for global companies that are moving money around globally to make a mechanism for us to essentially reduce costs.”
Google Cloud confirmed its interest to Fortune. “It’s pretty clear that this is probably one of the biggest upgrades to payments since the SWIFT network,” said Rich Widmann, head of Web3 strategy at Google Cloud. Apart from confirming that the company is exploring stablecoin integrations, he also acknowledged accepting a couple of payments using PayPal’s PYUSD.
While Google Cloud provided detailed on the record comments about its stablecoin interest, other companies mentioned in Fortune’s report were more circumspect. The report said that Airbnb had been in stablecoin discussions since the beginning of the year, but a spokesperson contradicted this. Likewise, it said Apple had been in talks since January and X was discussing stablecoins with Stripe, citing sources.
In many cases, the big tech firms are looking to save on Visa and Mastercard merchant fees. For large merchants, stablecoins provide the potential to flip the script. If they choose to only accept one or two stablecoins instead of paying Visa or Mastercard, they could negotiate incentives with stablecoin issuers who will share some of the interest earned on the stablecoin reserves. This is the model that underpins the Global Dollar which is administered by Paxos and includes institutional distribution partners such as Robinhood, WorldPay, Galaxy and Anchorage Digital.
Meanwhile, the second largest stablecoin issuer Circle made its New York Stock Exchange debut yesterday. The upscaled IPO price was set at $0.31 but is currently trading at $1.12. The excitement and publicity could spur more exploration.
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