Layman’s Field Guide to Digital Assets: Stablecoin Use Cases – Volume 2

Having defined Stablecoins in Volume 1 of the Layman’s Field Guide to Digital Assets, the natural next question is: What can my organization use Stablecoins for? To address this question, we outline below three of the most common enterprise use cases currently observed in the market.

Use Case #1 – International Payments

Moving capital across borders remains slow, costly, and operationally burdensome. Traditional international transfers often take three to five business days to settle and can involve meaningful foreign exchange fees. In contrast, Stablecoin transactions typically settle within minutes and do not expose users to foreign exchange volatility. Transaction costs are often negligible, frequently amounting to a fraction of a penny, representing significant savings relative to existing cross-border payment rails.

According to a study conducted by EY, cross-border supplier payments were identified as the leading Stablecoin use case among surveyed corporates and financial institutions. As large enterprises increasingly leverage their purchasing power to encourage adoption of these payment methods, a network effect is expected to drive accelerated uptake. Over time, international counterparties may begin to require settlement in Stablecoins after recognizing initial efficiency gains and seeking to scale those benefits across their operations. We encourage organizations to proactively consider how they would respond if Stablecoin payments became a requirement to maintain key supplier relationships.

Use Case #2 – Treasury Management

For financial institutions and corporates with international operations, prefunded accounts are often an unavoidable consequence of doing business globally. As a result, critical working capital is tied up in low-yield or non-productive accounts, while also creating additional administrative complexity. Stablecoins have demonstrated strong product-market fit in treasury management by enabling more efficient liquidity deployment.

Because Stablecoin transactions can settle within minutes, compared to the typical three-to-five-day window for international wires, organizations gain greater flexibility in managing working capital and can reduce the need for excess prefunding. While the operational benefits are compelling, firms must continue to account for statutory, regulatory, and legal-entity-specific requirements. Partnering with trusted advisors who have hands-on experience in the digital asset ecosystem is essential to realizing these efficiencies in a regulatory compliant manner.

Use Case #3 – Interest-Bearing Assets

The United States benefits from a mature and resilient financial system; however, these conditions are not universal. In certain jurisdictions, persistent inflation, capital controls, or structural weaknesses in the financial system can limit access to reliable savings and investment vehicles. Locales such as Argentina, Zimbabwe, and South Africa come to mind. In such environments, individuals and institutions may seek to hedge local currency exposure through the long-term holding of U.S. dollar-denominated Stablecoins.

In these cases, Stablecoins are deployed into yield-bearing instruments to generate interest. However, the mechanics of deploying this capital is novel, and may pose operational difficulties for entrants into the market. We suggest partnering with experienced market participants before considering investing in yield bearing products.

Conclusion

With a market capitalization exceeding $300 billion, Stablecoins have clearly achieved product-market fit. As American corporates and financial institutions increasingly interact with Stablecoins, the role of trusted advisors will be critical—not only to successful implementation, but also to ensuring compliance with evolving legal, regulatory, and accounting frameworks.

At Stablecoin Transaction Advisory Group, we combine deep digital asset expertise with a strong accounting and financial controls background to support institutions as they transition to modern, blockchain-based financial rails.

For any questions on payments, treasury, Stablecoins or digital assets, please reach out to Jake Souleyrette at Soul@stabletxn.com.