Regulation & Policy
Brazil's Banco Central do Brasil published Resolution BCB No. 561 on April 30, barring fintechs and payment firms from using stablecoins or crypto assets as settlement within the country's regulated eFX cross-border payment corridors, effective October 1, 2026. Individual holdings remain legal.
Stablecoins
Senators Tillis and Alsobrooks struck a bipartisan yield compromise, clearing the CLARITY Act for a Senate Banking Committee markup the week of May 11. Coinbase CEO Armstrong endorsed within hours. Passive interest prohibited; activity-based rewards explicitly protected.
RWA
BlackRock filed a formal comment letter with the OCC opposing a proposed 20% ceiling on tokenized assets as stablecoin reserves under the GENIUS Act's draft rulemaking. The cap would constrain BlackRock's BUIDL fund. BlackRock is asking the OCC to remove the limit and expand eligible asset types.
Stablecoins
Coinbase Asset Management partnered with Superstate to launch CUSHY — a stablecoin credit fund whose tokenized share class will issue onchain via Superstate FundOS on Ethereum, Solana and Base, expected to go live in Q2 2026. Northern Trust handles fund administration.
Funding
Tether Investments proposed merging Twenty-One Capital (43,514 BTC, $3.3B), Jack Mallers' Strike (operating in 100+ countries) and Raphael Zagury's Elektron Energy (~50 EH/s mining capacity) into a single publicly listed Bitcoin platform. XXI shares jumped 8% in after-hours trading.
AI
Tether-backed Oobit launched Agent Cards — virtual Visa cards funded from a USDT treasury and issued per AI agent. Spend policies are server-enforced, every transaction logged in real time. KYB-verified onboarding rolls out through Q2 2026.
Funding
Tether Investments proposed merging Twenty One Capital (XXI), Jack Mallers' Strike, and miner Elektron Energy into one listed entity. The combined company would hold 43,500+ BTC, mine ~5% of hashrate at <$60K all-in, and run Strike — XXI popped 8%.
Stablecoins
Meta has rolled out USDC stablecoin payouts to creators in Colombia and the Philippines via Stripe, with on-chain delivery on Solana and Polygon. Four years after shelving Libra under regulatory pressure, Meta is back in stablecoins — through the safest possible wrapper.
Stablecoins
Visa expanded its stablecoin settlement pilot to nine blockchains by adding Base, Polygon, Canton Network, Arc and Tempo, joining existing support for Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche and Stellar. Annualized stablecoin settlement volume hit $7 billion — up 50% quarter-over-quarter.
Web3 Payments
Visa is partnering with WeFi, the crypto payments startup founded by JL van der Velde after he left Tether, to bridge stablecoin and on-chain settlement into Visa's global merchant rails.
Stablecoins
Western Union CEO Devin McGranahan said USDPT, its Solana-based US dollar stablecoin, launches in May. WU will use it to settle agent transfers without SWIFT, plus a 'Stable Card' for global consumers and a Digital Asset Network for crypto cash-out.
Stablecoins
Morgan Stanley launched MSNXX on April 16, a $1.00-NAV government money market fund built for stablecoin issuers required to hold high-quality liquid assets under the GENIUS Act. Holdings: short-dated US Treasuries and overnight repos.