Mastercard Broadens Stablecoin Settlement to USDC, RLUSD and SoFiUSD

Mastercard is widening its stablecoin settlement program by adding more regulated U.S. dollar stablecoins to credit-card clearing, according to CoinDesk. The company said the expansion is designed to give issuers and acquirers more ways to settle transactions intraday and outside traditional banking hours, including weekends and holidays, moving the network closer to 24/7 operations. The additional stablecoins include Circle's USDC, Ripple's RLUSD and SoFi's newly launched SoFiUSD. Mastercard will also support multiple Paxos-issued stablecoins, including PYUSD, USDG and USDP. Mastercard said growing demand for speed and liquidity in fund transfers is driving increased use of stablecoins in settlement. The updated setup aims to help partner institutions complete more settlements beyond standard bank cut-off times. The initiative builds on existing relationships rather than introducing a single new partnership. USDC has previously been used for settlement in select markets. Last fall, Mastercard also partnered with Ripple and Gemini to explore settling transactions with RLUSD on the XRP Ledger. Mastercard characterized the latest step as an expansion that extends stablecoin settlement from limited use cases into a broader set of payment and clearing workflows. Mastercard said the settlement capabilities will be deployed across networks including Ethereum, Solana, Tempo, XRP Ledger and Base, with initial coverage in the United States and Latin America. Early participants include ARQ and CBW Bank, along with Cross River and Lead Bank. Payment services provider Nuvei is also included in the initial group. Mastercard expects coverage to continue expanding through the rest of the year. For the payments industry, the move signals that major card networks are steadily shifting stablecoins from pilot programs into more core clearing infrastructure.