Stablecoin transaction count, volume up despite market cap decline
Homepage>News>Business>Stablecoin transaction count, volume up despite market cap declineStablecoinsare surging in both their number of transactions and transaction volume, despite a reduction in. . .
Homepage>News>Business>Stablecoin transaction count, volume up despite market cap declineStablecoinsare surging in both their number of transactions and transaction volume, despite a reduction in overall market cap and new regulatory schemes trying to bring a close to the sector’s wild west period. Stablecoin usage soars in June even as market cap fallsRevolut delisting USDT as MiCA-compliant stables take overMiCA 2. 0 to include non-EU stablecoin issuers?Tether’s Q2 should be a doozyVisa(NASDAQ: V), on-chain analytics say adjusted stablecoin transaction volumetied its all-time high of $1. 78 trillionin the month of June, matching February’s total but 62% higher than May’s $1. 1 trillion. (For the record, ‘adjusted’ volume eliminates “high-frequency and high-volume trading wallets, high-frequency and high-volumesmart contractaddresses, [and]bot-related activity. ”)The USDC token issued byCircle(NASDAQ: CRCL) claimed $1. 2 trillion of June’s total, whileTether’s USDT accounted for $571. 7 billion. From there, it’s a steep dollar-denominated drop-off, as thePYUSDtoken issued byPayPal(NASDAQ: PYPL) claimed a $2. 42 billion slice, while the Global Dollar consortium’sUSDGcame in at $1. 77 billion andRipple Labs’RLUSDadded $754. 3 million. (Circle’s euro-denominated EURC’s totaled $1. 25 billion. )The transaction volume surge is all the more impressive given that the overall stablecoin market cap has been shrinking. Since May 1, the total cap has declined by nearly $9 billion, with USDT down roughly $5. 3 billion to $184. 2 billion, USDC down ~$4 billion to $73. 3 billion and PYUSD falling nearly $600,000 to $2. 8 billion. USDG bucked this trend as its cap rose by nearly $800,000 to over $3. 2 billion. June also saw the adjusted stablecoin transaction count nearing 203. 4 million, of which 145. 8 million was claimed by USDT, while another 57 million involved USDC. That leaves just ~600,000 transactions involving all other stablecoins, regardless of what currency they’re based on. (EURC led non-dollar tokens with 180,000 transactions. )In network terms, USDT’s primary transaction rails in June wereBinance’sBNB Chain(62. 6 million), followed byJustin Sun’sTRONnetwork (50. 17 million transactions),Solana(8. 36 million),Ethereum(7. 42 million), Celo (6. 78 million), andPolygon(3. 93 million). Most of June’s USDC transactions (19. 82 million) were conducted on Solana, well ahead of the 12. 46 million onBase, the Ethereum layer-2 network operated byCoinbase(NASDAQ: COIN). The rest of USDC’s top-five was filled by Polygon (7. 96 million),Arbitrum(5. 77 million) and Ethereum (3. 98 million). In terms of transaction volume, Base claimed the bulk ($564 billion) of USDC’s June total, followed by Ethereum ($389. 4 billion) and Solana ($214 billion). USDT moved the most money on Tron ($318. 8 billion), Ethereum ($163. 7 billion) and BNB Chain ($56. 3 billion). Notably, theStable networkbacked by Tether and its affiliatedBitfinexdigital asset exchange handled only $33. 8millionin transaction volume last month. But hey, Stable’s only been around a year, and Stable handled nearly 9x that sum when you add in the ‘unadjusted’ numbers, so don’t throw this stable baby out with the bathwater just yet. Over the first half of 2026, total stablecoin adjusted transaction volume hit $8. 8 trillion, only $2 trillion below 2025’s full-year total and $3 trillion above 2024’s tally. USDC accounted for ~70% of the H126 total, while USDT claimed a 25% share. EU stablecoins shrinking in number, growing in market capTether took a reputational hit last week as the crypto division of United Kingdom-based fintechRevolutannounced it would delist USDT. The move is apparently intended to comply with the European Union’sMarkets in Crypto-Assets(MiCA) regulatory scheme, which took effect on July 1. Tetherhasn’t sought MiCA approval, and is unwilling to comply with MiCA’s requirement for ‘systemic’ (aka large) stablecoin issuers to keep 60% of their reserve assets in cash in EU banks. Revolut’s customers lost the ability to buy USDT on July 6 but can still deposit the token until July 30. Customers can continue to sell their USDT for cash or withdraw the tokens to an external wallet, but only until August 31. After that date, Revolut will automatically convert the value of any remaining USDT in customer accounts to the fiat currency of a customer’s home territory. Revolut didn’t specify which of its customers will lose USDT access, but said the decision was made due to “regulatory and risk considerations. ” MiCA applies across the European Economic Area (EEA), which includes all EU member states along with Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway. Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino previouslycalled MiCA“a very not well thought legislation” that is “very dangerous when it comes to stablecoins. ” Ardoino believes MiCA is “even more dangerous” for EU-based small- and medium-sized banks ifstablecoin issuers face a run, aka the need to withdraw billions’ worth of their deposits on short notice, but the banks have lent it out in keeping with their fractional reserve policies. According to the European Securities and Markets Authority’s (ESMA)Interim MiCA Register, there are 35 e-money tokens (EMT) that have so far made the grade. But to date, not a single registration has been given to an asset-referenced token (ART), the value of which can be based on assets other than currency (like gold), a basket of currencies, and more. Only three of the approved tokens—USDC, EURC, and USDG—have a spot on the top-50 stablecoin market cap chart, and two of those are from a single issuer (Circle). There are 21 authorized EMT issuers licensed by 12 countries, led by France with six locally approved issuers (including Circle). On July 5, EU-based fintech Decta issued itsEuro Stablecoin Trends Report 2026, offering perspective on how eight MiCA-compliant euro-backed tokens fared as the regulatory implementation deadline drew near. The eight tokens’ combined market cap grew 128% to US$674 million in the 12 months ending June 30, with EURC,EURCV, andEURIaccounting for most of this gain. EURC’s cap doubled to over $433 million while EURCV, issued by French bankersSociété Générale(NASDAQ: SCGLY), shot up nearly 181% to $137. 8 million. EURI, issued by Luxembourg’s Banking Circle, didn’t launch until this January, but its cap currently sits at $38. 6 million, down from its early-May peak of $60 million. Over the same period, the combined weekly average daily trading volume of these eight euro-backed tokens rose 43. 1% to $67. 3 million. EURC claimed just over half ($34 million) of this total, followed by EURCV ($17. 5 million), the Netherlands-based Quantoz Payments’ EURQ ($12. 9 million), EURI ($5. 5 million), and the StablR-issued EURR ($4. 3 million). Decta notes that EURR’s average daily volume took a major nosedive in the final week of the 12-month period, falling from $4. 1 million to just $26. CoinGecko statsshow EURR’s market cap hovering around $13 million for most of 2026, but on June 3, it fell to just $934,000 before spiking to over $154 million on June 7 before falling below $3 million on June 9. EURR’s current cap currently sits at just over $10 million. For the record, Tether madean investment of undisclosed size in StablRin December 2024, one month after it madea similarly unquantified investment in Quantoz. Back to the top ↑Will MiCA expand to cover non-EU stablecoin issuers?On July 8,Euro Newsreported that the European Commission (EC) is consulting with stakeholders over whether to broaden MiCA’s scope to cover non-EU stablecoin issuers as well as “new tokenized means of payment and deposits. ”Euro News says this consultation will extend to September 30 but quoted an unidentified EU diplomat saying reopening MiCA “seems unavoidable at this stage, not only in light of the position expressed by several European institutions (not least the ECB), but also to cater for the most recent regulatory and technological developments worldwide. ”The European Central Bank (ECB) has repeatedly expressedunease with the growing popularity of dollar-backed tokensin the EU, labeling them a threat to monetary sovereignty. There are also concerns that MiCA’s stricter requirements regarding issuers’ cash reserves could spark a run on EU banks by non-EU holders of stablecoins whose issuers don’t redeem tokens directly with customers. (Similar redemption concernshave been expressed by the Bank of England regarding itssterling-backed stablecoin plans. )The EClaunched a separate MiCA consultationin May that ends August 31 that includes some stablecoin questions, including the aforementioned redemption concerns, but didn’t address tokenization. Back to the top ↑Tether’s Q2 should be a doozyGetting back to Tether, its investments are by no means limited to MiCA-compliant stablecoin issuers. Barely a week goes by without Tether announcing a new stake in some company, including this week’sannouncementof a $20 million stake inMercado Bitcoin, Brazil’s largest digital asset exchange, which has been diversifying its operations to include stablecoin-based payments, tokenization, and a whole lot more. Tether’s chief investment officer is Zachary Lyons, the former deputy of Richard Heathcote, who transitioned to a non-executive advisory position with the company in March after three years in the role. On July 6,Bloombergreported that Heathcote is looking to sell “part” of his 1. 26% stake in Tether and is working with investment bankers PJT Partners on discussions with potential buyers. However much Heathcote sells, his shares in the company likely won’t enjoy the lofty $500 billion valuation Tether gave itself when itattempted to raise $20 billionfrom investors last year. That latter figure wasreduced to $5 billionafter investors reportedly demanded more transparency on the reserve assets supporting USDT’s $184 billion market cap. Tether is infamous for a decade’s worth of promises to conduct a truly independent third-party audit of its reserves, butnever following through. In March, following its fundraising fail, Tether announced that it had“entered a formal engagement with”a ‘Big Four’ accounting firm (later revealed to be KPMG) to conduct a “full independent financial statement audit” of its reserves. Tether’s last‘attestation’ of its reservescame out in May, meaning its Q2 report is due sometime next month. Whether that Q2 report will contain figures audited by KPMG remains to be seen, as Tether has said little about the progress its auditors may or may not have made since that March announcement. Regardless of who’s doing the numbers, Tether’s Q2 is expected to be brutal. Unlike stablecoin issuers that restrict their reserves to cash, U. S. Treasury bills and other trusted vehicles, Tether’s Q1 reserves included $6. 6 billion worth of theBTCtoken, $19. 8 billion worth of gold, ‘secured’ loans of $15. 8 billion and billions more in ‘public equities’ and ‘other investments,’ the latter category including ‘indirect gold, bitcoin and other asset exposure. ’That’s a problem because both BTC and gold suffered significant plunges during Q2, and if those ‘other investments’ suffered similar declines, longtimeTether criticsbelieve Tether’s assets could be worth $4 billion less than they were three months ago. That’s more than half the ‘equity’ (aka surplus) that Tether claimed in Q1, and God help Tether if the individuals/entities on the other side of itscontroversial loansare under similar financial pressure. Perhaps that explains last month’sannouncementthat Tether would attempt to monetize its gold bricks by bringing itsgold-backed XAUT tokento theLedn digital asset lending platform. Ledn previously offered loans to users who supplied BTC and Ethereum’s native token ETH as collateral but Ledn ditched ETH a year ago, saying “Bitcoin-backed lending is what we do, what we do best, and soon, all we do. ”That BTC-only focus is now history, possibly because BTC hasan undeserved reputation as ‘digital gold,’so it’s notreallycheating to add XAUT. It may also have something to do with the fact that Tethertook an unspecified investment in Lednlast November, and Ledn has since incorporated USDT and Tether’s U. S. -facing stablecoinUSAT. Funny how that works. Back to the top ↑Watch: CBDCs or stablecoins? What the industry leaders actually thinktitle="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen>Tagged: