Stellar is seeing a significant expansion in institutional usage during 2026, with tokenized real-world assets, stablecoins, and regulated bank pilots moving deeper into blockchain settlement infrastructure. Reported RWA value on the network climbed from roughly $1 billion in January to $4 billion by early September, representing about 300% growth in eight months. The increase passed milestones near $2 billion in April and $3 billion in June.
U.S. Bank added a concrete institutional settlement use case by completing a live cross-border pilot of its USBDC stablecoin between North America and Europe on Stellar. According to the bank, the completed on-chain transfer included payment, redemption, freezing, and clawback capabilities, aligning blockchain settlement with traditional banking risk and compliance controls.
Other financial institutions are also expanding Stellar-based activity. Franklin Templeton's BENJI fund, active on Stellar since 2021, has roughly $654 million on the network and supports peer-to-peer movement, yield distribution, and collateral functions. MoneyGram has launched a native MGUSD stablecoin on Stellar, while USDT0 arrived on September 2, linking Stellar to unified USDT liquidity exceeding $180 billion across more than 26 networks.
Looking ahead, planned connectivity with the DTCC during the first half of 2027 could place traditional securities such as U.S. Treasuries, major ETFs, and Russell 1000 securities on shared infrastructure with tokenized instruments. Nuvanté has also tested Stellar-based stablecoin clearing through the Bank of England Synchronisation Lab. For the native asset, XLM remains tied to Stellar's core operations: transactions require XLM for fees, accounts require XLM reserves, and smart-contract resources and path payments connect the token directly to network activity.
