It's Not Just About Crypto: Why Banks Should Take Stablecoins Seriously

By 2025, stablecoins will have processed a transaction volume of over $33 trillion ^[1] — more than Visa and Mastercard combined.^[2] Furthermore, a significant increase in stablecoin transactions has been observed, particularly in Europe following the introduction of MiCAR. As a result, Europe has established itself alongside Ethereum and Solana as one of the leading regions for stablecoin activity. Anyone who still considers this a niche crypto topic is missing the biggest shift in payment infrastructure since SEPA.

Stablecoins are still often viewed as purely a “crypto issue.” This perspective is too narrow. In the current market phase, stablecoins are emerging less as a speculative product and more as an infrastructural building block of programmable financial markets^[3], with direct relevance for payment transactions, settlement, and liquidity management in the banking sector. 

From SEPA to Stablecoins: The Next Stage of Payment Infrastructure

The automation of clearing and settlement through electronic payment systems, the introduction of real-time settlement via TARGET2, and the pan-European harmonization achieved through SEPA have digitized, accelerated, and standardized financial market infrastructure over the course of decades. Stablecoins continue this trend, with one key difference: they enable programmable, round-the-clock settlement that can reduce settlement times from the current T+2 to near real-time (T+0).^[4]

From Infrastructure Development to Operational Value Creation

The development of stablecoins can be divided into two phases: The first phase was characterized by the establishment of institutional custody infrastructures and regulatory frameworks, particularly through MiCA. Now comes the phase of operational value creation. Stablecoins are realizing their potential as the foundation for programmable 24/7 settlement. Two areas of application illustrate this. First, in Delivery-vs-Payment (DvP), the delivery of securities and payment are settled in a single atomic transaction on the blockchain—the counterparty risk that exists for days in traditional settlement is completely eliminated. A practical example of this is NRW.BANK’s first tokenized bond worth 100 million euros, which was issued in the summer of 2025 entirely on the basis of blockchain technology (Polygon network) and is maintained in a digital issuance register in accordance with the German Electronic Securities Act (eWpG). In such a transaction, the token shares and the payment in central bank money or stablecoins can be settled fully automatically within minutes and without counterparty risk.^[5]

Second, with streaming payments, payments no longer flow in discrete amounts but continuously—for example, in the case of rent or lease payments for tokenized real estate, where payment flows can be linked to usage down to the second. One conceivable example is a tokenized commercial real estate bond in which tenant payments in stablecoins flow to a smart contract hourly or even every second, and the owner bills for the usage period in real time.

In this context, stablecoins do not function as an end product, but rather as an infrastructure layer that reduces time, liquidity, and risk costs.

Consortium Structures: Why Stablecoins Only Work in a Network

As infrastructure matures, the organizational structure is also evolving. Significant stablecoin initiatives are increasingly less likely to emerge as standalone projects and are instead being developed within consortium-based structures supported by banks and other institutional players.

A recent example illustrates this trend. Nine leading European banks, including Raiffeisen Bank International, UniCredit, ING, DekaBank, and CaixaBank, have formed a consortium to issue a MiCA-compliant, euro-based stablecoin. The issuance will be carried out through a new company based in the Netherlands, which is to be licensed as an e-money institution under the supervision of the Dutch central bank. The first stablecoin issuance is planned for the second half of 2026.^[6] The message behind this consortium structure is that trust, liquidity, and regulatory sustainability in payment transactions cannot be achieved in isolation, but only efficiently through collaboration.

The consortia in question are not static entities, but rather an operational necessity. A single institution cannot generate sufficient network liquidity nor effectively bundle all the functions required for a stablecoin. Within the consortium, key roles are deliberately separated: issuance, reserve management, custody, compliance, and settlement are assigned to clearly predefined parties.

This division follows established principles of financial market infrastructure and reduces concentration, liability, and operational risks. At the same time, this division of labor creates the conditions for scalability and regulatory transparency.

The Digital Euro and Stablecoins: Competition or Complementarity?

Against this backdrop, the question is often raised as to whether a digital euro could pose a threat to stablecoins in the long run. Analyses by the European Parliament clearly indicate that the two approaches are complementary. ^[7] While a central bank currency is designed as a neutral legal tender with broad basic functionality, private-sector stablecoins enable specific programmability. This flexibility is crucial, particularly in industrial value chains — such as in IoT payments or machine-to-machine transactions — and can only be achieved to a limited extent through a central bank currency. The digital euro safeguards monetary sovereignty and serves as a universal means of payment. Private-sector stablecoins, on the other hand, enable tailored, programmable payment logic for specific value chains — a division of labor that reinforces rather than cannibalizes each other.

Risks and Unresolved Issues

Despite the maturity of the infrastructure, risks remain that banks must take into account in their strategic assessments. Depegging events, such as the collapse of TerraUSD in 2022, have shown that algorithmic stablecoin models without full reserve backing pose systemic risks. Even fully backed stablecoins involve counterparty risks related to reserve holdings as well as operational risks in the technical infrastructure. Furthermore, the regulatory implementation of MiCA is still in its early stages: key issues — such as reserve requirements, e-money licenses, and interoperability between different stablecoin systems — will only be clarified in practice over the medium term.

Strategic Positioning: What Roles Can Banks Play?

For banks, this brings a key question to the forefront. It is no longer a matter of “whether” to engage with stablecoins, but rather “how” to strategically position themselves. Consortium-based stablecoin models open up roles that directly build on existing core competencies, such as:

• Custodian of tokenized monetary assets: Safekeeping of stablecoin reserves and tokenized assets—a natural extension of existing custodial banking functions.
• On- and off-ramps between fiat money and tokenized forms: Banks as an interface between traditional payment transactions and tokenized infrastructure — comparable to their current role in foreign exchange and payment transactions.
• Liquidity provider for 24/7 settlement: Providing liquidity in stablecoin networks to enable real-time settlement even outside traditional trading hours.

Stablecoins are not an alternative to the existing banking system. Organized as consortia and embedded within the regulatory framework, they are becoming an integral part of the financial market infrastructure, with concrete implications for business models, processes, and the strategic direction of banks.

The key question is not whether stablecoins will become relevant, but what role your bank intends to play in this new infrastructure. Our experts at Horn & Company can help you assess the strategic implications for your business model, from role analysis to operational implementation. Please feel free to contact us.

Sources

^{[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-01-08/stablecoin-transactions-rose-to-record-33-trillion-led-by-usdc?embedded-checkout=true}

^{[2] Visa transaction volume: $14.2 trillion (based on 2025 financial statements); Mastercard: $9.8 trillion (based on 2024 financial statements)}

^{[3] See https://www.metzler.com/de/metzler/news/bank/asset-management/2511-pi-stablecoins}

^{[4] See https://www.riksbank.se/globalassets/media/rapporter/pov/artiklar/engelska/2019/190613/er-2019_1-payment-systems--historical-evolution-and-literature-review.pdf}

^{[5] See https://cashlink.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/DE_Cashlink-unterstuetzt-erfolgreich-die-erste-Blockchain-basierte-Anleiheemission-der-NRW.BANK-1.pdf}

^{[6] See https://finance.yahoo.com/news/nine-european-banks-launch-mica -130701192.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cucGVycGxleGl0eS5haS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAEThlMs7g8Quxgx3tfDkjjA2zJR4C-lzV4QB -G1XQIvuTwTBdSL2UoyExNxPCVWsVhz46ZGBUXXvWTgT_845u2a_EOp1yUMI_9UOUKW_iK7zORO10tW44XIUmeiunhP6O9OydSLqzWc6FnkSY2Pjf7NFt_oJ FtMdHJGc8-4OU6GC}

^{[7] See https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/IDAN/2025/764387/ECTI_IDA%282025%29764387_EN.pdf}