Stablecoins Get a Seat in the C-Suite

Watch more: How Stablecoins Are Transforming Enterprise Financial Strategy

Keeping an open mind is key to learning.

Few innovations across payments and finance may require industry leaders to keep an open mind more than stablecoins.

Stablecoins are digital assets pegged to a fiat currency, most commonly the U.S. dollar. Once the preserve of cryptocurrency enthusiasts and decentralized finance (DeFi) evangelists, these blockchain-native stores of value are becoming a tool targeting the very plumbing of enterprise finance.

To unpack what their appeal might be across corporate finance functions, Stable Sea CEO Tanner Taddeo and Trovata CEO Brett Turner sat down for a discussion for the PYMNTS series “Summer School,” moderated by PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster.

“Summer school used to be where you went when you were about to flunk algebra,” Webster said. “Now it’s where CFOs go to avoid flunking payments strategy.”

For Stable Sea’s Taddeo, stablecoins in enterprise finance promise near-instant settlement, lower costs and global reach.

“Moving $10 [million] to $30 million across borders into exotic corridors typically takes three to five business days,” he said. “With stablecoins, it can settle in four to eight hours.”

Faster settlements, in turn, can help improve cash forecasting, reduce counterparty risk and potentially free up capital otherwise stuck in transit. In short, stablecoins are being positioned as a solution to a problem that’s long frustrated finance leaders: the inefficiency of global money movement.

But can stablecoins deliver on that promise within the rigid, risk-averse world of corporate treasury?

The emergence of stablecoins as a viable option for the office of the CFO is starting to collide with the reality of legacy systems.

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) platforms, bank APIs and reconciliation software are still architected around traditional rails. Concepts like atomic settlement (instant, irreversible transactions) don’t exactly map cleanly onto infrastructure designed for batch processing and end-of-day reconciliation.

“Treasury has always been the last to modernize,” Turner said. “Everything around it is digital — supply chains, CRMs, ERP systems — but cash management is stuck in the past. Stablecoins are kind of where the puck is going … but it’s still very early days.”

“ERP systems and bank ledgers are like two separate universes,” he added. “Between them is the Grand Canyon, which we call reconciliation. Stablecoins can build a bridge.”

Smart contracts and blockchain-based ledgers offer real-time, verifiable transactions. In theory, this can eliminate the need for the tedious matching of payments and invoices. But until ERP providers and financial software vendors adapt their architectures, the benefits of stablecoins may continue to be throttled by system-level incompatibilities.

Even as settlement windows shrink, one question looms: Do CFOs really want to hold stablecoins on the balance sheet?

There is, after all, the question of volatility and counterparty risk. Even though leading stablecoins claim to be fully backed by dollar reserves, the lack of FDIC insurance and central bank backing is a hurdle for risk-averse corporates.

“CFOs care about everything on their balance sheet,” Turner said. “Eventually [stablecoins] will be there. But it’s all in the context of their command center — overall working capital and forecast.”

That context is essential. Stablecoins are ultimately not about replacing fiat but about adding agility. In this vision, stablecoins become transitory instruments, not balance sheet liabilities. And automation is the real prize.

“You can see a nice pathway where stablecoin could be automated to automatically top up [a reserve] account so you never fall below reserve limits around the world,” Taddeo said.

“Every business has a stablecoin use case,” he added. “Whether it’s internal payroll, contractor payments or capital markets access. Form a tactical SWAT team to identify the right pilot.”

Turner agreed.

“Treasury often sits on an island,” he said. “It’s time for the CFO and treasury to converge and move proactively together.”

Above all, enterprises must develop the technical literacy to evaluate blockchain-based tools alongside traditional solutions, he said.

From the outside, stablecoins may still seem like a fringe innovation, but the transformation is already underway across emerging markets.

In countries where correspondent banking relationships are thin and local banking rails are plagued by delays, stablecoins can shine.

“The banking system works pretty well today in the G20 currencies … but stablecoins are solving real pain in emerging economies,” Taddeo said.

Traditional wires to places like Senegal can take up to 10 days due to layers of correspondent banks. Stablecoins eliminate those intermediaries, but local banking rails — still operating on 9-to-5 schedules — impose their own limits.

“Settlement will still be same day, but it won’t be instant,” Taddeo said. “It’ll be between two to six hours, constrained by the banking infrastructure.”

Whether G20 banks accelerate this transition or stifle it may come down to posture. Some are building their own stablecoins. Others are investing in FinTechs like Trovata and Stable Sea. So, which is it — cooperation or competition?

“There’s this trust,” Turner said. “The bank is always going to be that foundation … but stablecoins allow more innovation to be built on top. It’s going to benefit the bank’s customers and accelerate innovation.”

Taddeo added: “To bring Web3 infrastructure into the future, you need software development around blockchain to be married with deep payments and capital markets expertise … There’s still absolutely the need [for banks] … on the on-ramp or the off-ramp.”

At the same time, interoperability remains a concern, as the number of issuers is beginning to draw parallels to America’s pre-Civil War era of fragmented bank currencies.

“If there’s not interoperability … that could definitely slow the industry down,” Taddeo said. “There’s a new stablecoin every day. Ensuring they can all coexist is critical.”

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