Visa and Mastercard adopt USDC payouts across 200 countries

Visa and Mastercard announced commercial stablecoin funding routes on Oct. 15 that give eligible businesses new ways to fund payments.

Visa's route prefunds Visa Direct cross-border payouts through Inyo Global, while Mastercard's platform through BVNK connects stablecoin balances to local-currency bank payouts.

The change concerns the money supplied at the start of a payment. On Mastercard's bank-payout route, a business can use a stablecoin balance while the recipient receives local currency in a bank account. That separates the funding choice from whether the payee uses crypto.

Visa identified Inyo Global, a payments infrastructure provider, as the first enabler to put its Visa Direct stablecoin prefunding capability into commercial production. The offering is for eligible Visa Direct clients and partners.

Inyo serves money transmitters, fintechs, banks and payment businesses. Its integration lets the businesses it serves prefund cross-border payouts with USDC in near real time, Visa said, offering an alternative to relying solely on traditional funding windows.

Inyo says the funding option operates around the clock through the same APIs its customers already use.

Mastercard Global Money Platform is available now through BVNK, a stablecoin infrastructure firm, the companies said. It combines fiat and stablecoin accounts, conversion and payout capabilities that banks, fintechs and enterprises can embed in their own products or use for their own treasury and payments.

Mastercard Move supplies the local-bank payout connection. Users can draw on stablecoin balances to make payments in recipients' local currencies, combining funding and conversion with conventional bank delivery.

Businesses can contract directly with BVNK and operate through its portal or API for their own treasury and payouts. According to its product documentation, they can also embed accounts and payments under their own brand through an API, with BVNK managing customer onboarding.

BVNK names USDC and OUSD among the stablecoins accessible through the integration. The companies said Nuvei and Marqeta will be among the first to integrate the platform, placing those integrations in the planned rollout.

Mastercard expects payout coverage to expand to more than 40 currencies across more than 200 countries and territories in 2027, according to its launch announcement. That remains an expansion target.

The launch announcements disclose no measured stablecoin payment volume or realized fee savings for these routes. For participating businesses, the immediate change is another way to fund payments that can ultimately reach conventional bank accounts.