INVESTOR FIELD GUIDE / RESEARCHED OCTOBER 29, 2026
Stablecoin market map for startup investors
A stablecoin pitch can describe a token issuer, a payments business or software that never holds customer money.
Those businesses have different customers, economics and risks. Our market map helps you place a company in the ecosystem and follow the money before evaluating a startup investment.
across six functional categories
Research snapshot: October 29, 2026. A representative landscape of 20 companies and products, with established and acquired reference points labeled. Inclusion is research, not an investment recommendation.
Explore the market mapThe stablecoin market map
A stablecoin is a digital token recorded on a blockchain, a shared transaction ledger. It's designed to track a reference value, often a U.S. dollar or euro. Its design doesn't guarantee that value or immediate redemption. The businesses around it issue tokens, supply operating tools, move money and serve end users.
An application programming interface (API) lets software systems request functions from one another.
Issuers
Create stablecoins and arrange issuance, backing and redemption.
- AgoraAUSD issuance and minting/redemption APIs.
- CircleUSDC and EURC issuer group. Public-company reference point.
- PaxosUSDG issuance through jurisdiction-specific entities.
- TetherUSD₮ issuance and redemption. Established ecosystem reference point.
Infrastructure
Provide building blocks that other businesses use to operate stablecoin products. Wallets manage private keys, the secret credentials used to authorize transactions. Custody means holding or controlling assets for others; orchestration coordinates providers and steps in a money flow.
- BridgeStablecoin orchestration, wallets and issuance APIs. A Stripe company.
- FireblocksWallets, policy controls and payment orchestration software.
- TurnkeyWallet creation, transaction signing and key-management APIs.
- zerohashEmbedded settlement, custody and liquidity infrastructure.
Payments
Collect, transfer, convert or settle money for businesses. Fiat means government-issued money; settlement completes a transfer between the parties.
- BVNKStablecoin and fiat sending, receiving and conversion. Part of Mastercard.
- ConduitFiat and stablecoin pay-ins, payouts and accounts.
- Triple-AMerchant checkout and business payouts with local-currency settlement.
Treasury
Help businesses manage balances, approvals, transfers and cash operations involving stablecoins.
- OpenTradeTreasury and stablecoin yield infrastructure.
- Request FinanceBusiness balances, invoice approvals and stablecoin payment workflows.
- UtilaTreasury balances, transfer policies and stablecoin operations.
Compliance
Supply risk information and tools used in compliance programs.
- ChainalysisBlockchain monitoring and investigations.
- EllipticWallet screening, transaction screening and issuer-risk tools.
- TRM LabsWallet and transaction risk monitoring, including stablecoin flows.
Applications
Own an end-user workflow in which stablecoins are part of the underlying product.
- Félix PagoWhatsApp remittances using stablecoin settlement infrastructure.
- MiniPayPhone-number-based stablecoin wallet and transfers. An Opera product.
- MorseConsumer receiving, sending and spending with USDC, USDG or EURC balances, depending on region. Formerly Sling Money, a product of Avian Labs.
How to read the map
Each entry has one primary placement based on the job its product performs. That placement is our editorial judgment. Infrastructure can include payment functions; a treasury product can include wallets and payouts. An application belongs here because it owns the end-user experience, even when another provider handles settlement.
The October 29, 2026 boundary is functional coverage supported by accessible first-party evidence. We focus on fiat-referenced stablecoins and the businesses using them for money movement, operations and customer products. General crypto tools need a clear stablecoin use case to qualify.
The selection is unranked. It does not establish funding stage, independence, availability for investment or suitability for a particular customer. Circle is public; Bridge and BVNK are acquired; MiniPay is an incumbent-owned product. Other entries should not be assumed to be independent early-stage startups. Buying a token is different from owning equity in the business behind it.
Several businesses in different panels can depend on the same issuer, bank or wallet provider. Our co-founder and general partner Elizabeth Yin writes in Democratizing Knowledge, “Don't try to pick a co. Select a portfolio.”
A spread of category labels can still leave you exposed to one shared dependency. Startup investing is risky, and most bets may fail.
What each category sells
Issuers sell access to a redeemable token
The issuer creates tokens and defines the arrangements for their backing and redemption. A distributor, wallet brand or payments partner may put the token in front of customers without being its legal issuer.
Agora, Circle, Paxos and Tether show why the entity distinction matters. Agora identifies Agora Bermuda Limited as AUSD's issuer. USDG identifies jurisdiction-specific Paxos issuer entities. The relevant counterparty is the entity responsible for the token and the particular service.
Buyers and partners include fintechs, payment providers and businesses needing stablecoin access. The business-model lens is who receives reserve income, who pays issuance or service fees, and how distribution economics are shared. Those arrangements differ by issuer and contract.
The key dependency is the complete backing-to-redemption chain, including reserve holders, banking access and the holder's redemption rights. The concrete diligence question is: Which legal entity owes redemption, to whom, under what conditions, and what happens if a reserve or banking partner fails?
Infrastructure sells building blocks and operating capacity
Infrastructure lets developers add wallets, signing, custody or settlement to another product. Some providers supply software; others also perform financial services.
Bridge combines several of these functions. Turnkey focuses on wallet and signing tools. Fireblocks supplies wallet, control and payment-network technology, with financial services delivered by partners. zerohash includes settlement, custody and liquidity infrastructure. These are materially different operating roles within the same category.
The buyer is usually a developer team, fintech, bank or payment platform. Evaluate recurring software fees and usage-based revenue against integration work, support costs and any partner charges. A company can have extensive technical integration while its customer retains most of the commercial relationship.
The key dependency is control over assets and execution across the provider chain. The diligence question is: If the main wallet, banking or settlement provider becomes unavailable, which functions stop, and can the customer move its assets and records elsewhere?
Payments sells completed money movement
A payment provider earns its place by getting money from the sender to the recipient in the required currency and account. A blockchain transfer can be one step in that journey. Cash conversion, recipient delivery and reconciliation can remain separate steps.
BVNK covers fiat and stablecoin sending, receiving and conversion. Conduit combines pay-ins, payouts and accounts. Triple-A brings the category closer to the merchant through checkout and business payouts. Conduit is a financial technology company, with banking services provided by partners.
Buyers include merchants, marketplaces, finance teams and platforms embedding payments. The business-model lens is the fee or foreign-exchange spread retained after liquidity, network, banking, payout and servicing costs. Total payment volume alone does not show the provider's revenue or margin.
The key dependency is reliable local access at both ends of a payment corridor, meaning the sending and receiving markets. The diligence question is: For one real customer route, what does the recipient receive, how long does delivery take, and who bears failed-payment and conversion costs?
Treasury sells control over business money
Treasury products help a finance team decide where balances sit, approve transfers and explain what happened in the books. Request Finance combines balances and invoice/payment workflows. Utila emphasizes wallet balances, policies and transfer operations. OpenTrade adds API infrastructure for treasury deployment and embedded yield products.
The buyer is a finance or operations team. Evaluate subscription or platform revenue against the work required to connect accounting, banking and wallet systems. Where revenue comes from asset balances or yield arrangements, identify the underlying asset, fees and risk separately.
A yield strategy adds exposures beyond holding the stablecoin itself. Depending on its structure, those can include lending, asset-price, liquidity, counterparty and smart-contract risks. A smart contract is software that executes instructions on a blockchain. Treasury software and yield products should not be treated as insured bank deposits or risk-free cash.
The key dependency is the connection between control, liquidity and records. The diligence question is: Who can authorize a transfer, who controls the assets, and can the finance team reconcile a failed transaction without losing its audit trail?
Compliance sells evidence for control decisions
Compliance vendors help teams identify risky wallets, monitor transactions and investigate activity. Chainalysis, Elliptic and TRM Labs supply different combinations of analytics, screening and investigation tools. They support decisions made within a customer's control program.
Buyers include issuers, financial institutions, payment providers and investigators. Evaluate software contracts and usage revenue alongside implementation costs, coverage, data quality and the work required to resolve alerts. A high alert count can create an expensive operations queue.
The key dependency is whether the information is useful in the customer's actual workflow. A risk label can be incomplete, late or wrong; customers need an escalation process and records of their decisions. Outsourcing tools does not erase a regulated firm's responsibilities, as the EU's outsourcing rules make explicit for crypto-asset service providers.
The diligence question is: What happens after an alert, who decides whether money moves, and what evidence supports that decision?
Applications sell a useful customer outcome
Applications make the technology part of a familiar task. Félix Pago provides WhatsApp-based remittances; its settlement provider describes the stablecoin integration. MiniPay offers a self-custodial wallet, meaning users control their wallet credentials, with conversion services supplied by partners. Morse keeps customer balances in digital euros (EURC) in Europe and digital dollars (USDC or USDG) outside Europe for its consumer money product.
The end user might be sending money home, receiving income or moving money between accounts. Evaluate how the business makes money through the relevant fees, conversion, subscriptions or partner arrangements. Customer retention and contribution after support, fraud and distribution costs matter more than wallet creation alone.
The key dependency is often the combination of customer acquisition and third-party financial infrastructure. The diligence question is: Does the customer return for a repeated financial task, and which issuer, wallet, payout or card partner must keep operating for that task to work?
Compliance follows the activity and jurisdiction
Category names describe product functions. They aren't legal classifications or findings that a company is licensed, authorized or compliant. Requirements depend on the activities, jurisdictions, entities and actual control of customer assets. A provider operating across several categories can face several sets of obligations.
U.S. and EU context as of October 29, 2026
The U.S. Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act became law on July 18, 2025. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) published its main implementing final rule on October 23, 2026, and states that the rule and Act take effect on January 18, 2027. Its rule covers entities within OCC jurisdiction.
The final rule was not yet effective on this research date, and other statutory provisions have different deadlines. The Federal Reserve's September issuer and custody measures were still proposals. See the OCC final-rule announcement and Federal Reserve proposals.
The EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) has applied generally since December 30, 2024, with issuer provisions applying earlier. The EU-wide transitional period for crypto-asset service providers ended on July 1, 2026. Issuer and service-provider permissions are distinct, and some stablecoin payment activities also interact with payment-services law. See the European Securities and Markets Authority's transition-end statement and the European Banking Authority's payment-services opinion.
The activity questions differ across the map
- Issuers: Identify responsibility for issuance, reserves, redemption and disclosures. A partner's brand or distribution agreement does not settle those questions.
- Infrastructure: Separate producing software from controlling customer assets or accepting and transmitting value. A software label does not create a blanket exemption.
- Payments: Identify who accepts, exchanges and transmits value in every relevant jurisdiction, including the providers handling conversion and local delivery.
- Treasury: Separate a business using assets for its own account from a provider managing or moving client assets. Lending, yield and investment features add separate questions.
- Compliance: Identify which controls the vendor supplies and which decisions, records and obligations remain with its customer. Vendors may also have obligations of their own.
- Applications: Follow the actual custody, transfer and exchange functions behind the interface. A self-custodial or noncustodial label does not determine the entire business's regulatory status.
These are diligence lenses drawn from the regulatory frameworks, not company-specific legal conclusions.
The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) explains in its activity-based guidance why control and operating facts matter. The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) states that sanctions obligations apply to virtual-currency transactions as well as fiat transactions within its jurisdiction. Anti-money-laundering obligations and sanctions obligations should not be collapsed into one label.
Trace one customer payment before evaluating the investment
Consider a hypothetical operating scenario: a U.S. business pays a contractor abroad, and the contractor wants local currency in a bank account. This is a money-flow example, not an investment-return projection.
- Start with the customer's task. Record the sending currency, receiving currency, amount, destination and required delivery time. Compare the complete journey with the customer's existing option.
- Name each counterparty. Identify the payment provider, stablecoin issuer, wallet or custodian, conversion provider and local payout partner. Record which legal entity contracts with the customer.
- Follow control and obligations. Establish who can move or freeze funds, who screens the parties and transactions, and who owns exception handling. Distinguish bank delivery from blockchain settlement.
- Follow the economics. Separate the customer's total charge from the revenue the startup retains. Include partner fees, conversion, failed payouts, compliance operations and support.
- Run a failure scenario. Suppose the payout partner is unavailable or redemption is delayed. Identify where funds sit, who owes the customer money and how the customer gets resolution.
Our general partner Elizabeth Yin puts the capital-allocation point plainly in Democratizing Knowledge: “Decisions are never in isolation - they are a comparison game.” Use the same customer route and cost boundaries when comparing businesses. A faster token transfer alone does not establish a better customer experience or an attractive equity investment.
Coverage, sources and refresh boundaries
This map reflects product evidence available on October 29, 2026. Company-name links lead to first-party product evidence; the Félix Pago settlement example also uses its provider's account of the integration. Undated live pages provide evidence of product functions at the research date. They don't establish when a feature launched. Regulatory links identify the official material supporting the legal context.
We selected examples for coverage of the six functions and verifiable product roles. We excluded token-price rankings, unsupported future products, general crypto tools without a clear stablecoin role and duplicate placements. The map is representative. It is not ranked and is not a complete census. Company-level licensing, reserve quality and investment availability were not assessed.
An acquisition, rebrand, product closure, change in issuer or banking partners, or material regulatory development calls for a fresh assessment of the affected entries.
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This is educational research, not investment, legal or tax advice. Inclusion does not establish safety, compliance or investment suitability. Startup investments are speculative, illiquid and can result in a total loss. Seek independent advice from qualified legal, tax and investment professionals for your circumstances.
