Visa CEO Ryan McInerney announced the payments giant will keep a neutral, multi-coin and multi-chain approach to stablecoins, refusing to endorse any single token over others. During Tuesday’s earnings call, he made clear that Visa’s role is to help clients connect to the stablecoin ecosystem securely and at scale—regardless of which coin or network ultimately dominates.
The comments came in response to a question about Open USD (OUSD), an upcoming dollar-pegged stablecoin backed by a consortium of over 140 companies including Visa, Mastercard, BlackRock and Coinbase. OUSD aims to differentiate itself by sharing reserve income with distribution partners, who can mint and redeem without fees or limits. This model sparked speculation that it could challenge leaders Tether (USDT) and Circle (USDC), even leading Mizuho to downgrade Circle and cut its price target. Bernstein later trimmed Circle’s valuation, though it downplayed the immediate threat.
McInerney stressed that stablecoins have yet to scale beyond a few use cases like stablecoin-linked cards, and that Open Standard’s neutral governance and shared economics are designed to foster wider adoption. He emphasized, “Our role is not to pick winners,” echoing Mizuho’s analogy of Visa as the “stablecoin of stablecoins”—a central connector for increasingly interchangeable digital dollars.
Earlier this month, Visa launched an internal platform to help banks and fintechs use stablecoins, initially integrating OUSD. Analysts note that Visa’s infrastructure-agnostic strategy insulates it from project-level risks and regulatory shifts, while pressuring stablecoin issuers to compete on transparency and reliability. Ark Invest’s Lorenzo Valente questioned the depth of partner commitments, suggesting support for OUSD may be closer to a soft letter of intent than a strategic bet. Meanwhile, Trading Strategy CEO Mikko Ohtamaa argued Visa’s neutrality is a tactic to slow stablecoins that could disrupt its core business.
The move underscores Visa’s belief that stablecoins are becoming permanent fixtures in global payments, capable of improving cross-border settlements and lowering costs.
