Why would someone pay with stablecoins when they already have a Visa or Mastercard?

Jess Houlgrave, CEO of WalletConnect, joins me to discuss where stablecoin payments make sense and what is holding them back.

WalletConnect works with around 700 wallets and 80,000 applications, reaching about 800 million end users. Around $400 billion in value moved through the network last year. The company is now pushing further into payments with WalletConnect Pay.

We get into the competition between stablecoins and cards, including the fees merchants pay and the challenge of getting consumers to change how they pay.

Jess explains why stablecoins can work well for cross-border payments and markets where card costs are high. We also discuss whether stablecoins are truly global and whether the market needs so many different stablecoins.

The conversation then moves to AI agents. Jess explains why stablecoins could work well for small AI payments and why moving money is only one part of a payment. Compliance and security still need to be handled.

We also discuss what happens to Visa and Mastercard if stablecoin payments continue to grow, and what merchants should consider before adding crypto payments.

We cover:

• Why merchants would accept stablecoins when cards already work
• Same-hour and same-day settlement and the impact on merchant working capital
• Stablecoins vs Visa, Mastercard, PIX and Faster Payments
• Whether stablecoins are actually global
• Why emerging markets are seeing strong stablecoin demand
• Whether the market needs hundreds of different stablecoins
• What stablecoins could mean for card network pricing
• Why payments require more than moving money from A to B
• Stablecoins, AI agents and micropayments
• How AI agents could buy products and services on our behalf
• What merchants should look for when choosing a stablecoin payment provider

A practical conversation about where stablecoins genuinely improve payments, where existing rails remain stronger, and how the two could coexist.

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