Stablecoin Payments: Bridging the "Last Mile" for Enterprises

Recently, stablecoins have become a hot topic. With Singapore releasing new regulations for digital payment token services, Hong Kong accelerating legislative regulation of stablecoins, and Shanghai official institutions organizing seminars on stablecoins, all parties are preparing for compliant stablecoins.

A certain company is building an operating system to help traditional enterprises and small to medium-sized enterprises use stablecoins, aiming to bridge the "last mile" of enterprise-level stablecoin payments, enabling companies to comply with regulations and safely and conveniently complete end-to-end needs such as receiving payments, sales, and payroll through stablecoins.

The CEO of the company stated that the infrastructure of the entire ecosystem is rapidly developing, with many companies exploring the public chain layer, stablecoin issuers, payment channels, compliance layers, and more. However, they believe that the "last mile" of enterprise payments still lacks mature solutions. In the U.S. ecosystem, the development of stablecoin payments in the "first mile" and "last mile" is relatively fast; while the Asia-Pacific ecosystem focuses more on the "middle mile," centering on payment channels.

The company focuses on bridging the "last mile" of enterprise-level stablecoin payments. They are not a bank, do not provide custody services, do not handle funds, and do not issue stablecoins; their core competency is to excel in full-process application layer development and process integration.

For example, when a company in Singapore or the United States needs to collaborate with a Web3.0 developer in Argentina, the Argentine developer may be more inclined to accept stablecoins. However, this involves a series of issues: how to purchase stablecoins? How to manage chain addresses? How to comply with anti-money laundering regulations? How to report taxes and integrate accounting systems? The entire process is fragmented and faces significant resistance.

The company's solution is to streamline the entire process, allowing enterprises to use it "seamlessly": developing an invoicing system for labor brokers and small and medium-sized enterprises in Asia, Africa, and Latin America to manage accounts receivable, enabling their clients to pay easily, securely, and in compliance through stablecoin across all channels.

In terms of global stablecoin project trends, the US market highly values APIs and SaaS. The most challenging aspects for businesses making payments are digital currency custody, deposit and withdrawal conversion, anti-money laundering (AML), etc. These needs are interconnected, and there is no need for each enterprise to build underlying capabilities. The Asian market has many brands moving towards payments, exploring the issuance of stablecoins, especially with cross-border payment companies taking frequent actions.

For small and medium-sized enterprises, the opportunities of stablecoin payments mainly lie at the application level:

1. Native scenarios: such as on-chain DeFi, smart contract-driven financial services.
2. Embedded Scenarios: Stablecoins can be embedded in vertical scenarios, such as gym management software upgrading services through embedded stablecoin payments.
3. Transforming traditional scenarios: For example, microloans and trade financing, stablecoins can enhance efficiency.

Experts believe that the long-term potential of stablecoins is underestimated. Stablecoins are not just "fast"; they are also "internet money"—programmable, composable, and permissionless, which will reshape the understanding of currency. Just as 4G is not only about "fast internet speed" but also gave rise to new business models like live streaming and O2O, stablecoins will also give birth to unknown scenarios.

In the future, the stablecoin market is expected to eliminate the "stigma," making people realize that cryptocurrencies are a technological innovation rather than merely associated with speculation and illegal activities. At the same time, traditional financial institutions may deeply engage in the market, providing compliance and account capabilities. Ultimately, stablecoins are expected to form a closed-loop usage, upgrading from the "fiat in - stablecoin transfer - fiat out" "sandwich model" to the full-scenario usage of stablecoins in "salary - loans - payments - consumption."

Overall, the "bubble" brought by stablecoins may be overestimated in the short term, but the long-term impact is often underestimated. This "bubble" is precisely the key to breaking the path dependence of traditional finance, providing the industry with the opportunity for "transformational change."