Visa is one of the largest payment providers and supporters of stablecoins, teaming up with Yellow Card to test its cross-border capabilities across three regions.
Visa confirmed it is expanding its stablecoin initiative by deepening its partnership with Yellow Card, a pan-African fintech, to pilot settlement capabilities across Europe, Middle East and Africa (CEMEA).
The extended partnership with Yellow Card,will explore new use cases and real-world applications for stable coin transactions. A particular focus will be on improving treasury operations and liquidity management in the regions where YellowCard is licensed to operate.
Yellow Card, which became one of the first fintechs to adopt PayPal’s PYUSD stablecoin in November 2023, currently offers the token as a payment method to customers across Africa.
“Together with Visa, we’re building a bridge between traditional finance and the future of money movement,” said Chris Maurice, Co-Founder and CEO of Yellow Card.
“We look forward to continuing to innovate new solutions that can transform how money moves for even more secure, efficient, and transparent payment solutions.”
The new partnership will look to expand the availability and usage of more stablecoins, including USDC, to enable cross-border transactions. Yellow Card and Visa will develop use cases to test reduction in settlement costs and if stablecoins can support 365-day settlement across CEMEA.
In 2023, Visa became one of the first payments networks to settle transactions with stablecoins, enabling clients to perform payments with USDC. Over $225m in stablecoin volume has been settled through Visa since.
Central to the partnership is the introduction of Visa Direct to help investigate stablecoin opportunities pertaining to cross-border settlement. The digital payment network facilitates cross-border transactions across 190 countries.
“In 2025, we believe that every institution that moves money will need a stablecoin strategy,” added Godfrey Sullivan, Visa SVP and Head of Product and Solution for CEMEA.
“As more players in the payments ecosystem explore this powerful new technology, Visa stands ready to help our partners navigate the transformation, bringing the scale, trust and innovation needed to help build the next generation of global payments.”
African financial inclusion opportunities
Stablecoins offer financial inclusion opportunities across Africa for underbanked or underserved populations.
They offer faster settlement times and significantly lower remittance fees. With just an internet connection, customers can access and use stablecongs, making them highly accessible in regions with limited or immature financial infrastructure.
For many unbanked Africans, this could offer a more seamless way to send and receive money across the continent, and even beyond. Furthermore, stablecoins are insulated from local currency volatility, making them a more secure and reliable means of payment where inflation is a persistent concern.