Something shifted over the past six months.

A consortium of nine European banks has announced plans for a shared stablecoin targeting a 2026 launch. JPMorgan expanded JPM Coin to support euro settlements. Société Générale launched EURCV with reserves held at BNY Mellon. All of this happened within a six-month window.

These are not pilot programs. They are production deployments backed by capital commitments and compliance frameworks. Institutions that spent years dismissing stablecoins as speculative instruments are now building them directly into core financial operations.

For anyone running an exchange, this changes the conversation. The question is no longer whether stablecoins belong in traditional finance. It is how quickly infrastructure adapts to what they have already become.

What Finally Changed

Two barriers fell at the same time, and banks moved fast.

First, regulators wrote rules banks already understand. MiCA in Europe and the GENIUS Act in the U.S. established frameworks that mirror existing requirements for money market funds and payment processors. Full reserves held in cash and government securities. Regular third-party attestations. Clear redemption rights. Strict AML controls. Once stablecoins began to look like regulated products banks already operate, compliance stopped being the bottleneck.

Second, the use case shifted from trading to payments.

In 2025 alone, USDT processed $156 billion in transactions under $1,000, based on on-chain data. These were not exchange transfers or institutional settlements. They were retail payments, remittances, and peer-to-peer transactions happening at scale across borders and time zones.

When stablecoins started behaving like money people actually use, rather than instruments shuffled between trading venues, banks could no longer ignore them.

Not All Stablecoins Are the Same

The market often treats stablecoins as a single category. That assumption is flawed.

USDC publishes monthly attestations showing reserves held almost entirely in cash and short-term U.S. Treasuries with regulated custodians. USDT publishes quarterly reports with a broader reserve mix, including Bitcoin and gold. This difference in composition is why S&P downgraded USDT, citing reserve-related risk.

DAI follows a different model altogether, using over-collateralization with crypto assets locked in smart contracts. This removes reliance on bank custody but introduces protocol execution risk.

Algorithmic designs, such as Ethena’s USDe, maintain their peg through derivatives rather than direct reserves. These models can generate yield in stable conditions but have shown vulnerability during stress, briefly trading well below peg during market disruptions before recovering.

These distinctions are not academic. They determine whether a stablecoin can function as settlement infrastructure or remains primarily a trading instrument. Banks understand this difference, which is why their own issuances follow fully backed, regulated models rather than algorithmic experiments.

Why This Matters for Payments and Beyond

Stablecoins have already replaced traditional payment rails in corridors where legacy systems fail.

Workers sending remittances from the Gulf to Asia pay under one percent in fees using USDT or USDC, compared with four to seven percent through traditional channels. Funds arrive the same day instead of three to five business days later. In countries with currency controls or unstable banking systems, residents hold stablecoins as synthetic dollar accounts for both savings and daily transactions. In several emerging markets, most crypto transaction volume is now stablecoin‑denominated rather than driven by Bitcoin or Ethereum.

This is not speculative behavior. It is functional money operating where banking infrastructure cannot.

Institutions also use stablecoins as collateral in derivatives markets, as settlement assets between venues, and increasingly as yield instruments when paired with Treasury exposure. They now sit at the intersection of payments, banking, and capital markets in ways no single traditional product replicates.

What Exchanges Must Do

Exchanges determine which stablecoin models survive and which do not.

When S&P downgraded USDT, exchanges reassessed risk exposure. When TUSD lost its peg in 2024 after reserve concerns surfaced, exchanges delisted it. These decisions shape the market more directly than regulatory guidance or issuer marketing.

I have watched exchanges struggle with this responsibility. The temptation is to list everything and let users decide. That approach fails because most users cannot independently evaluate reserve quality or protocol risk. Exchanges have to do that work.

The path forward is straightforward but demanding. Support stablecoins that meet institutional standards for reserves, transparency, and regulation. Educate users on differences between models so risk profiles are clear. Treat stablecoins as infrastructure, not speculative assets.

Stablecoin market capitalization now exceeds $300 billion, up from roughly $200 billion eighteen months ago. Active users grew more than 50 percent year over year, and institutions report engagement with stablecoins approaching 90 percent.

Banks are paying attention because the infrastructure works and the rules are clear. The question facing exchanges is whether they will support this infrastructure with the rigor it requires or treat it as another speculative product category.

At Phemex, our commitment is simple. Transparent reserves over opaque backing. Regulatory clarity over jurisdictional arbitrage. User education over unchecked expansion. The banks building stablecoins already understand what matters. Exchanges need to apply the same standard.

The industry can wait for regulation to force better practices, or it can implement them now.

We choose the latter.

Disclaimer