IOSG: Stablecoins Reshaping Cross-Border Payments in Asia? Strategic Overview and Investment Opportunities

Author｜ Turbo @IOSG

TLDR;

1. Cross-border payment companies' stablecoin strategies fall into three categories: stablecoin payment collection (accepting stablecoin settlements), stablecoin issuance (applying for licenses to issue their own stablecoins), and isolating regulatory risks through independent offshore brands. Currently, only a few companies have truly launched products.

   

2. Stablecoins offer limited advantages in terms of fees or speed for cross-border payments. With the widespread adoption of local payment channels, traditional transfer costs have been significantly reduced, with fees now primarily concentrated in the domestic settlement process – a process that stablecoins cannot bypass. Currency exchange is also unavoidable; stablecoins have not truly addressed these two core pain points.

3. Emerging digital banks (Neobanks) represent the highest-value link in the stablecoin cross-border payment value chain. The true advantage of stablecoin payments lies in their internal ecosystem; zero friction can only be achieved when both the payer and receiver settle in stablecoins. Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, regions with weak banking infrastructure, represent the strongest application scenarios, as evidenced by Tether's investment in SQRIL.

Myths about Stablecoin Cross-Border Payments

The stablecoin strategy of Asian cross-border fintech companies mainly includes three directions:

• Stablecoin usage: Accept stablecoin payments

• Stablecoin issuance: Applying for a license to issue stablecoins

• Independent Brand: Conducting cryptocurrency/stablecoin business through an offshore entity under an independent brand, thus isolating regulatory risks from domestic licenses.

Independent offshore entities are a necessary condition

All companies with substantial stablecoin businesses operate through independent offshore entities: KUN (owned by Yeepay), DFX Labs (owned by LianLian), and RD InnoTech (owned by RD Technologies).

Stablecoin payments are currently the only product available, but few companies disclose their fees and payment processing speeds.

Most companies started with stablecoin payments rather than issuing stablecoins, including LianLian, KUN, and OritaPay. Currently, only RD InnoTech is closest to actually issuing a stablecoin (HKDR).

However, no company has yet publicly disclosed the fees and processing speeds for stablecoin payment services, unlike other established payment companies. The only company to disclose its fees is BVNK, whose fee structure is: 0 yuan transfer fee + standard currency exchange fee + service fees for depositing and withdrawing from external wallets + blockchain transaction fee.

The issuance of Hong Kong licenses in March 2026 will be a turning point for the industry.

The HKMA will issue its first batch of stablecoin issuance licenses in March 2026, with a very small number of companies receiving approval. Currently confirmed applicants include RD InnoTech, JD, and Anchorpoint Financial. RD InnoTech has a higher probability of approval because it has already entered the HKMA stablecoin issuer sandbox.

The licensing results will determine which companies can advance from stablecoin usage to stablecoin issuance, and will also determine whether Hong Kong can become a true stablecoin center or continue to be restricted by Beijing's influence.

Reasons for the slow rollout of stablecoins by cross-border payment companies

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Stablecoins offer virtually no advantage in terms of fees or speed for cross-border payments.

For a cross-border business owner, completing cross-border payments from overseas to mainland China mainly involves three steps: fund transfer, foreign exchange, and domestic settlement.

• Transfer: Transfer funds from overseas buyers to the payment platform via SWIFT, local bank payment channels, or internal wallets.

• Foreign exchange: Converting foreign currency (such as USD, EUR) into RMB at a specific exchange rate.

• Domestic settlement: Withdraw the exchanged RMB to a bank account or Alipay account in mainland China.

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New channels such as local payment methods have reduced traditional transfer fees to near 0% and achieved near real-time speeds.

Traditionally, SWIFT transfers have been expensive and time-consuming, making them a major source of cross-border payment costs. In the companies analyzed in this article, transfer fees accounted for 56% of total costs. For example, using SWIFT through Airwallex incurs approximately $25.

However, many cross-border fintech companies already have local payment channels, which means:

• Fintech companies collect payments through local payment networks in the payer's location (such as ACH in the US, SEPA in Europe, and UPI in India), complete fund transfers within their own global networks, and then complete payments through the payee's local payment network, completely bypassing SWIFT.

The new channels have significantly reduced cross-border transfer fees. Currently, domestic settlements account for 58% of total fees.

However, domestic settlement is not a step that stablecoins can bypass, because users always need to hold RMB cash in their bank accounts.

Stablecoins cannot bypass domestic settlements, and foreign exchange is also an indispensable part of cross-border payments, leaving little room for stablecoins to improve user experience. Transfers are now nearly real-time with fees approaching zero; foreign exchange is the primary source of costs, and stablecoin companies also need to handle foreign exchange for their users.

In summary, if we compare cross-border transfers fairly (excluding domestic settlements and foreign exchange), stablecoins have no room for improvement.

Investment Insights: The Narrative of Emerging Digital Banks

Key Argument: Emerging digital banks (Neobank) are key to stablecoin cross-border payments.

The value chain of stablecoin cross-border payments consists of three layers:

1. Issuance Layer (Tether, Circle, HKMA Licensees): Creating Stablecoins

2. Infrastructure Layer (Bridge/Stripe, BVNK, Circle CPN): Stablecoin Circulation and Exchange

3. Distribution/Terminal Layer (Emerging Digital Banks): Transforming Stablecoins into Native Spending Power

Emerging digital banks represent a core bottleneck in the value chain, but also the source of the highest-value opportunities.

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Emerging digital banks are addressing the "last mile" problem.

Stablecoin cross-border payments only have a real advantage in an ecosystem where the stablecoin itself is the final destination (rather than a legal tender bridge).

If merchants receive payments in stablecoins, pay suppliers in stablecoins, and employees receive salaries in stablecoins and make purchases through emerging digital banks native to stablecoins, the entire transaction will be completed on-chain without touching traditional channels.

If either party needs to exchange the funds back to fiat currency, the withdrawal costs will be reintroduced into settlement fees comparable to those of native fintech channels. This is precisely why stablecoin payments are most compelling in areas with weak banking infrastructure, active remittance channels, or crypto-native communities.

In addition, Neobank users can earn above-average yields while holding stablecoins, which provides an additional incentive for users to choose stablecoins for cross-border payments, making them not only payment tools but also interest-bearing assets.

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It is essential to establish a presence in regions with weak financial infrastructure.

The most compelling use cases for stablecoins are those where they are more convenient than traditional banks:

• Southeast Asia (Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia): Over 44% of the population has no bank account; high penetration rate.

• Middle East/Africa: Vast remittance channels, weak local payment channels, and a positive and open regulatory attitude (the UAE has established four regulatory frameworks).

Tether plays a role in Vietnam's parallel financial system. Tether's investment in SQRIL indicates its growth strategy is betting on an emerging digital banking layer—allowing people to consume USDT locally in underdeveloped countries—which is the strongest market signal.

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Why Series A/B are the best investment windows

Stablecoin-based emerging digital banks are infrastructure-heavy businesses that require local licenses, local banking partners, KYC/AML compliance infrastructure, merchant networks, and the building of consumer trust.

• Seed round/Pre-A round too early: Business model is not proven, regulatory risks are high, and unit economic benefits are unclear.

• Series A/B funding is the optimal window: demand has been validated, compliance has been confirmed, unit economic benefits have been verified, and investment risk has been significantly reduced.

• Late-stage/IPO stage may be too late: valuations have already fully reflected the premium of mature business models.

Detailed Explanation of Stablecoin Strategies of Various Cross-Border Payment Companies

Airwallex

Airwallex has adopted a more cautious strategy: completing its internal infrastructure first, and then deploying it once regulatory and market conditions are ripe. This reflects the company's existing advantages in traditional payment channels, reducing the urgency of immediately adopting stablecoins.

Stablecoin/blockchain integration: Skeptical, no products launched yet.

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CEO Jack Zhang is skeptical of stablecoins.

• He believes Airwallex has achieved "real-time transfers with fees below 0.01%" and says, "You can't get it cheaper or faster than free."

• The company's official blog also reflects this stance, pointing out that existing local payment channels are already efficient enough.

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Internal stablecoin team

In July 2025, Airwallex posted 22 stablecoin engineer positions to build a token settlement platform team. The job postings disclosed that the company is building infrastructure to enable customers and internal systems to buy, hold, send, and settle tokens globally, supporting near-instant global payments, and enabling on-chain liquidity management and seamless conversion between fiat and stablecoins.

The planned application scenarios include: cross-border settlement in emerging markets, on-chain liquidity management, and programmable payments with fiat-to-stablecoin conversion services.

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status quo

• There are currently no stablecoin products available. Stablecoins were not mentioned at all in the mission update at the end of 2025.

• No publicly known partnerships have been established with Circle, Tether, or other stablecoin issuers.

• The strategic focus for 2026 is geographic expansion, AI-driven developer tools, and enhanced customer experience; stablecoins are not included.

• The company blog (January 2026) stated: Whether stablecoins have a valid value is still inconclusive.

XTransfer

Stablecoin/Blockchain Integration: Positive Attitude, but No Products Launched Yet

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Offshore stablecoin payment services

In August 2025, XTransfer announced that it would launch an overseas stablecoin receiving service within the year, initially open to a select group of customers. However, as of February 2026, there had been no public confirmation of the service's official launch.

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Speculation: Dual wallet model

XTransfer's core stablecoin strategy is a dual-currency wallet model, which allows businesses to hold both fiat currency and stablecoins simultaneously.

WorldFirst (Ant Group)

Stablecoin/Blockchain Integration: WorldFirst has not yet addressed this at the product level, but Ant International is building blockchain infrastructure.

• WorldFirst's own products do not currently offer stablecoins or crypto services. Its official services do not include any blockchain, stablecoin, or digital currency related content; all WorldFirst products operate through traditional banking channels.

• However, the parent company, Ant International, is building significant blockchain infrastructure, which is expected to gradually extend to WorldFirst:

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Whale Platform Tokenized Deposit Service (TDS)

In 2024, over one-third of Ant International's total transaction volume exceeding $1 trillion was processed through the Whale platform using blockchain technology. This is not a stablecoin, but rather a tokenized deposit service (TDS).

Tokenized deposits are issued by licensed banks, not stablecoin companies. Taking HSBC as an example, tokenized deposits allow HSBC customers to create digital records for their traditional fiat currency deposits. HSBC holds the fiat currency deposits, while each digital record on DLT is a transferable token, allowing customers to complete fund transfers without waiting for bulk processing.

In May 2025, Ant Group and HSBC jointly launched Hong Kong's first blockchain settlement solution, tokenized deposit service, which supports real-time payments in Hong Kong dollars and US dollars through corporate wallets.

• Other tokenized deposit partners include: DBS Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, OCBC Bank, BNP Paribas, JPMorgan Kinexys Digital Payments, and Deutsche Bank.

• UBS Digital Cash (November 2025): UBS Singapore signed a MoU with Ant International to explore multi-currency tokenized deposit capabilities and integrate them into the Whale platform.

• Standard Chartered Bank (December 2025): Launched tokenized deposit schemes for Hong Kong dollars, offshore RMB (CNH), Singapore dollars and US dollars on the Whale platform, and completed a cross-bank token transfer of HK$38 million (from HSBC to Standard Chartered).

• Ant International has partnered with ten international banks to support tokenized deposits on the Whale platform.

• The application of tokenized deposits in transaction banking under the Monetary Authority of Singapore's (MAS) Project Guardian program (ISDA and Ant Group jointly released an industry report on the use of tokenized bank liabilities for foreign exchange settlement).

Yeepay

Stablecoin/Blockchain Integration: Yeepay's official products do not directly integrate it.

• Yeepay's official products do not integrate stablecoins. However, Yeepay's co-founders are actively developing stablecoin payment services through the independent brand KUN.

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KUN Product Matrix

Note: KUN indicates that it only serves customers "outside of mainland China and the United States".

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KUN Partners and Integration

• Circle Payments Network (CPN): Launched. Circle has confirmed that KUN is a CPN partner, supporting 24/7 USDC/EURC stablecoin settlements. The CPN mainnet will officially launch in mid-2025, initially connecting 29 financial institutions.

• WSPN: WUSD (USD-pegged stablecoin) has been integrated into the KUN Space platform for cross-border business transactions (March 2024).

• Marco Digital (01942.HK): It has reportedly completed Asia's first USDT-based insurance commission payment through KUN (August 2025).

LianLian Pay (连连付/连连数字)

Stablecoins/Blockchain: Already implemented, integrating stablecoins through partners.

• Lianlian Pay is one of the Chinese cross-border payment companies with the most proactive stablecoin strategy.

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Circle/USDC MOU: Still in the exploratory stage, no products have been launched yet.

Signed an MOU with Circle to evaluate the use of USDC for large-scale international payment flows. Explored the application of Circle's Layer-1 blockchain, Arc, in future payment scenarios.

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BVNK Partnership: Stablecoin Payment Integration Now Available (June 2025)

Funds flow: Merchants deposit stablecoins → BVNK is automatically converted to USD → Lianlian completes the transfer through its global network.

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RD Technologies: HKDR Stablecoin

RD has partnered with RD Technologies, which plans to issue HKDR (a Hong Kong dollar-pegged stablecoin) on Ethereum. RD has also been using RD Technologies' RD ezLink corporate identity verification and RD Wallet payment tools, and has partnered with HashKey Exchange and Cobo.

HKDR is currently still in the sandbox/testing phase. The collaboration cannot be fully implemented until RD Technologies obtains a formal stablecoin issuer license from the HKMA (expected in March 2026).

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DFX Labs: A virtual asset trading platform (wholly owned by Lianlian Pay, a Hong Kong-listed subsidiary)

Main businesses include:

• Cryptocurrency Trading: Buying and selling Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

• Wallet services: Virtual asset custody/storage

• Liquidity services

• DFX Labs has obtained a VATP license (Type 1 - Securities Trading + Type 7 - Automated Trading) issued by the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC). Conditions for full operation include completing an on-site inspection and rectification by the SFC and passing an independent penetration test.

RD Technologies

Founded by the former president of HKMA, its core competitive advantages include:

• Regulatory Background: Former HKMA President serves as Chairman; among the first participants in the sandbox.

• Dual licenses: SVF (fiat currency payment) + stablecoin sandbox

Core Businesses: Payments (OristaPay) + Stablecoin Issuance (RD InnoTech)

• Operating under the SVF license (SVF0016) issued by HKMA in December 2022.

• A multi-currency e-wallet supporting 8 currencies for business payments and exchange rate management.

• Transfer methods: FPS (Fast Payment System), CHATS, Wire Transfer (TT)

Two independent business lines:

1. OristaPay: A fiat-based B2B cross-border payment and wallet service provider, positioned as a "next-generation payment infrastructure provider".

2. RD InnoTech Limited: Focuses on stablecoin issuance (HKDR) and blockchain/Web3 business.

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OristaPay (RD Wallet)

OristaPay has launched its Global Collection product, supporting cross-border payments in fiat and stablecoin currencies, with 24/7 liquidity and particularly strong presence in the African and Latin American markets.

• Supports accepting payments in over 100 currencies, covering 200+ countries and regions.

• Accepts mainstream stablecoins, has fast settlement capabilities, and conducts real-time AML and KYT compliance screening.

• Global Collection's specific fees have not been publicly disclosed.

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RD InnoTech Stablecoin Issuance — HKDR

RD InnoTech has been selected as one of the first members of the HKMA Stablecoin Issuer Sandbox, along with Standard Chartered/Animoca/HKT (HKDG) and JD CoinLink (JD-HKD).

Stablecoin regulatory timeline:

• December 2022: HKMA issued SVF license (SVF0016)

• July 2024: Selected for the HKMA Stablecoin Issuer Sandbox (First Batch)

• August 2025: Hong Kong's Stablecoin Ordinance officially came into effect.

• September 2025: Brand restructuring, OristaPay and RD InnoTech spun off as independent entities.

• January 2026: OritaPay Global Collection officially launched and supports stablecoins.

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Important cooperative relationship

ZA Global co-led a $40 million Series A2 funding round for RD Technologies. An MOU was also signed with ZA Bank.

• Reserve Custody: ZA Bank provides custody services for HKDR reserve assets.

• Distribution: ZA Bank explores becoming a sales/distribution partner for HKDRs

Other partners: Allinpay International, Ripple, Circle Payment Network (CPN)

Appendix: Comparative Analysis of Cross-border Payment Company Fees and Settlement Speed

Rate Comparison: $100 remittance from overseas to China (lowest rate)

Scenario: Transferring $100 USD from overseas to a domestic bank account, with each step using the lowest available rate from each company.

Remark:

• XTransfer charges a 0.1% settlement fee, which requires a certain transaction volume; the standard fee rate is a maximum of 0.4%.

• WorldFirst's total fee is $0 based on personal Alipay withdrawals; B2B bank withdrawals are 0.3% (B2C) or 0.4% (B2B).

• Yeepay's local payment transaction fees range from 0.6% to 1.6%, while the CNY settlement fee is not publicly disclosed.

• LianLian's 0.3% settlement fee rate is suitable for high-volume users; the standard fee rate can be as high as 0.7%.

• RD Technologies has not disclosed its transaction fees or processing time.

Rate Comparison: $100 remittance from overseas to China (highest rate)

Remark:

• Airwallex charges a flat fee of $25 per transaction for SWIFT; this is 25% of the transaction amount up to $100, which is relatively reasonable for larger transactions.

• Yeepay credit card acquiring: Base fee rate 3.8% + $0.30 + cross-border surcharge 1% + currency conversion fee 3%, a $100 transfer will cost a total of $8.10.

• LianLian Wish Payout has a maximum fee of 0.75%; the settlement fee is a maximum of 0.7%.

• RD Technologies charges HKD 400 (approximately $51.28) for TT wire transfer including correspondent bank fees; domestic CNY settlement services are not provided.

Speed ​​comparison: Remittances from overseas to China (fastest)

Speed ​​comparison: Remittances from overseas to China (slowest)

Remark:

• XTransfer X2X requires both the buyer and seller to be users of the XTransfer platform.

• WorldFirst's 1-minute Alipay transfer service applies to personal Alipay accounts, not corporate bank accounts.

• Yeepay's fastest transfers are subject to a T+1 to T+2 CNY settlement period.

• RD Technologies does not offer CNY settlement services within mainland China; the service is only available within Hong Kong.

• The bottleneck for the slowest path for all companies lies with SWIFT, which adds 1-7 days of waiting time before currency exchange/settlement.