Mastercard has announced a strategic partnership with Yellow Card, a licensed stablecoin infrastructure provider focused on Africa, to expand stablecoin-enabled payment services across Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EEMEA). The collaboration will initially target cross-border remittances, business-to-business (B2B) settlement, digital loyalty systems and treasury management in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates.
The companies plan to work with local banks, financial institutions and regulators to test compliant stablecoin payment models. Joint working groups will identify high-demand use cases and develop interoperable solutions that connect Mastercard’s global network with blockchain-based settlement rails. Mastercard’s Crypto Credential framework will support security and compliance checks for stablecoin transactions.
The partnership comes as stablecoins gain traction in markets where traditional cross-border payments remain costly and slow. Yellow Card brings experience from African markets where stablecoins are already used for savings, trade and transfers, while Mastercard continues to build out its blockchain payment ecosystem. The move follows Mastercard’s recent pilot with JPMorgan, Ripple and Ondo Finance on near real-time settlement using tokenized U.S. Treasuries, and its work with Rain, MoonPay and Fiserv.
Market response saw Mastercard shares (MA) initially dip 1.04% to $491.89 before recovering 0.19% in pre-market trading to $492.56 following the announcement.
