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Visa, Mastercard, Stripe and Coinbase consortium launches Open USD stablecoin

A new issuer backed by the card networks and the largest payment processors brought a dollar-pegged token to market on Wednesday, entering a stablecoin sector dominated by Tether and Circle.

Assembled by Claude from 10 sources at 10 outlets · Thursday, October 1, 2026, Morning edition, 10:28 AM EDT · no human byline

Disclosure. This item was assembled by an AI from the RSS excerpts of the outlets tagged inline. No human wrote or checked it before publication. Feed selection and categories are editorial choices by Teresa Lo. Nothing here is investment advice.

What happened

A consortium backed by Stripe and Visa issued a US dollar-pegged stablecoin on Wednesday, in what Bloomberg described as one of the most significant entries into the market to date bloomberg.com. The issuer, Open Standard, launched Open USD on Ethereum, Solana, Base and Tempo, with the token issued by Stripe's Bridge unit and Coinbase access starting later unchainedcrypto.com. Open Standard is backed by Visa, Mastercard, Stripe, Coinbase and Shopify finance.biggo.comcryptonews.net.

Stripe said OUSD on Tempo is now its default stablecoin configuration, and that businesses can use the token across its payments, treasury, payouts and card products thedefiant.io. Businesses can hold OUSD directly with Stripe Treasury, spend that balance with stablecoin cards and send OUSD to crypto wallets pymnts.comfxnewsgroup.com. PYMNTS framed the launch as an attempt to eliminate currency conversion fees pymnts.com.

Why it matters to investors

The incumbents are large. Open USD is entering a stablecoin market worth more than $300 billion and still dominated by two players, with Tether's USDT accounting for about $143 billion coindesk.com. CoinDesk reported that Open Standard is pursuing a different model, which it characterised as building money rather than simply issuing a token coindesk.comcryptonews.net.

The structural difference is where the economics sit. BigGo reported that Open USD debuts with an equity-sharing model aimed squarely at challenging Tether finance.biggo.com. For the card networks, the move puts them on the issuance side of a settlement rail that has until now routed around them, which is why Briefs expects stablecoin payments to start appearing at checkout and inside the treasury tools businesses already use briefs.co.

What to watch

Distribution is the first test rather than technology. The consortium's advantage is the merchant and processor base it already owns, and TradingView noted that despite growing institutional interest, breaking the dominance of USDT and USDC remains a significant challenge tradingview.com.

Three markers follow. The first is whether OUSD supply builds to a scale that registers against the incumbents, given Tether's USDT alone accounts for about $143 billion of a market worth more than $300 billion coindesk.com. The second is the Coinbase leg, which was not live at launch and which widens retail reach when it opens unchainedcrypto.com. The third is the rate backdrop: Bloomberg's own coverage carried the Treasury 10-year yield hitting its highest level since 2002, and reserve income on short-dated government paper is the core of every large issuer's revenue model bloomberg.comcoindesk.com. The Defiant noted that Stripe has already made the token its default configuration, so adoption inside its own stack is not in question thedefiant.io.

Sources

  1. bloomberg.com: Stripe, Visa-Backed Consortium Launches Dollar Stablecoin - Bloomberg.com (2026-10-01)
  2. coindesk.com: Open USD takes on Tether , Circle with a different stablecoin model that's 'building money' (2026-09-30)
  3. unchainedcrypto.com: Open USD Stablecoin Goes Live as Stripe, Visa and Mastercard Open It to Businesses (2026-09-30)
  4. pymnts.com: Payment Giants Launch Open USD Stablecoin to Kill Conversion Fees - PYMNTS.com (2026-09-30)
  5. thedefiant.io: Open USD Launches as Stripe's Default Stablecoin - The Defiant (2026-09-30)
  6. tradingview.com: Mastercard, Visa, Stripe-Backed Consortium Enters USD Stablecoin Market - TradingView (2026-09-30)
  7. finance.biggo.com: Visa, Mastercard-Backed Open USD Debuts With Equity-Sharing Model to Challenge Tether (2026-09-30)
  8. briefs.co: Open Standard Launches OUSD Stablecoin Backed by Visa - Briefs Finance (2026-10-01)
  9. fxnewsgroup.com: Stripe partners with Open Standard to make OUSD available to businesses - FX News Group (2026-09-30)
  10. cryptonews.net: Open USD takes on Tether , Circle with a different stablecoin model that's 'building money' (2026-09-30)