Zach Abrams, co-founder of Bridge (acquired by Stripe in 2024), is leading Open Standard and its flagship asset, Open USD (OUSD). The structure abandons the traditional stablecoin playbook: no minting fees, no redemption fees, no volume caps, and reserve yield flowing to the issuer's partners rather than to a single operator.
That yield distribution is the entire business difference. Circle's USDC holds a $73 billion market cap and Tether's USDT roughly $145 billion. Both park their backing in short-term U.S. Treasuries and pocket the interest. Open USD proposes to redistribute that income across its distribution network, keeping only a management fee for Open Standard itself. Circle's stock fell as much as 15% on the announcement, a direct market signal of competitive pressure.
The roster is expansive: payment networks (Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover), banks (BNY, Standard Chartered, DBS, U.S. Bank), tech platforms (Google, Shopify, IBM), and crypto firms (Coinbase, Ripple, MetaMask, Aave, Bybit, OKX). Governance is distributed among partners rather than centralized in a single issuer. Visa's Cuy Sheffield confirmed the firm's participation on X, framing it as a move toward broader adoption.
Open USD is scheduled to launch in 2026 across Solana, Stellar, Base, and Polygon. Tempo's CEO Matt Huang confirmed native issuance and support for payments, DeFi, and liquidity operations from day one.
This model is not novel. Paxos already operates the Global Dollar Network (USDG) with Robinhood, Kraken, and Galaxy Digital, using the same yield-sharing premise. In Europe, Qivalis brings 37 banks and payment providers together around a euro stablecoin as institutions push back against U.S. dollar dominance in digital assets.
The timing reflects a genuine market shift. Stablecoins have moved beyond crypto trading into cross-border settlements, merchant payments, and corporate treasury work. Citi projects the global stablecoin market will reach $4 trillion by 2030. That scale explains why major payment networks and banks are moving now: the infrastructure for dollar settlement in digital rails is consolidating, and reserve yield economics are becoming a genuine competitive lever.