Coinbase, Visa and Stripe Back Open USD With More Than $1 Billion as Stablecoin Battle Intensifies
A new dollar-backed stablecoin has entered the market with an unusually powerful group behind it, as Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe and Visa commit more than $1 billion to build liquidity for Open USD in a direct challenge to the economics that have long dominated the stablecoin industry.
Open USD, or OUSD, officially went live on September 30 across Ethereum, Solana, Base and Tempo, giving businesses a new digital dollar designed primarily for payments, settlement, treasury operations and cross-border financial services rather than cryptocurrency trading alone.
The stablecoin launched with approximately 468.4 million OUSD in circulation, backed by around $468.45 million in reserve assets. More than $400 million of liquidity was also deployed across decentralized exchanges, bridges and stablecoin swap infrastructure.
But the more significant figure is the commitment from Open Standard’s five founding partners — Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe and Visa — to provide more than $1 billion in liquidity over the coming months.
Together, those companies give the new stablecoin something most new digital currencies struggle to build: distribution.
Open USD Is Trying to Change the Economics of Stablecoins
Open USD is issued by Bridge, the stablecoin infrastructure company acquired by Stripe for $1.1 billion in 2024.
But the organization behind OUSD, Open Standard, is structured differently from a conventional stablecoin issuer.
Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe and Visa are its five founding partners and investors, with each receiving an equal initial equity stake.
The wider network has already expanded to more than 200 financial institutions, fintech companies, banks and global businesses.
The model is designed to give those companies an economic reason to distribute OUSD.
Partners can receive rewards based on the amount of OUSD supply and transaction activity they generate on their platforms, while qualifying partners can also earn equity in Open Standard.
That is an important departure from a model in which the stablecoin issuer retains most of the financial benefit generated by reserves.
Businesses Can Move Between Dollars and OUSD at No Cost
Open Standard is also removing one of the costs associated with moving between conventional money and stablecoins.
Businesses can mint and redeem OUSD against the US dollar at a 1:1 rate without minting or burning fees.
Open Standard instead charges a small transaction fee.
That model is particularly relevant for businesses that move money frequently across borders, where repeated conversion between fiat currency and stablecoins can make transaction costs more significant.
The company is targeting use cases including banking, international payments, institutional trading and settlement.
Rather than positioning OUSD primarily as a cryptocurrency asset for investors, Open Standard wants businesses to treat it as programmable digital money.
Stripe Immediately Gives OUSD Access to a Massive Payments Network
Stripe represents one of the most important distribution channels available to the new stablecoin.
The payments company processed approximately $1.9 trillion in total payment volume in 2025, meaning even limited adoption of OUSD across its infrastructure could create substantial transaction activity.
Businesses using Stripe can now access OUSD alongside other supported stablecoins.
Developers can build products using Stripe APIs and its wider stablecoin technology stack, including Bridge for orchestration, Privy for embedded wallets and Stripe Issuing for stablecoin-linked cards.
Companies can also hold OUSD through Stripe Treasury, spend balances using cards and transfer the stablecoin to cryptocurrency wallets in more than 100 countries.
Accounts can be funded through OUSD on Tempo, Base, Ethereum and Solana, as well as through traditional banking rails including ACH, SEPA and wire transfers.
That combination illustrates the broader strategy: connecting blockchain-based money directly with existing financial infrastructure rather than creating a separate crypto ecosystem.
Visa Is Building Its Own Institutional Gateway to OUSD
Visa provides another major distribution route through its Visa Stablecoin Platform.
The platform is designed for fintech companies, financial institutions and other businesses that want to use stablecoins for treasury, settlement and payment operations.
Eligible clients can mint, redeem, manage and transfer OUSD through Visa’s infrastructure.
Visa also provides wallet technology and institutional controls including destination allowlists, dual approvals and passkey-based signing.
However, Visa’s Open USD service is currently in limited beta, with geographical and volume restrictions.
This distinction matters because OUSD may have the backing of some of the world’s largest payments companies, but its availability is not yet universal.
Coinbase Adds Trading, Custody and Conversion Infrastructure
Coinbase provides another part of the distribution network.
Its OUSD integration includes 1:1 conversions, wallets, trading, custody, payment orchestration, financing and fiat on- and off-ramps.
The stablecoin is also becoming available through major centralized and decentralized trading venues including Coinbase, Kraken and Uniswap.
Mastercard provides another integration route, including buying and selling OUSD, transfers, settlement and wallets.
Businesses can therefore reach the same stablecoin through different infrastructure providers depending on how they intend to use it.
That interoperability is central to Open Standard’s strategy.
Reserves Sit With BlackRock, BNY and Lead Bank
The assets supporting OUSD are held through institutions including BlackRock, BNY and Lead Bank.
At launch, reserve data showed approximately $257.2 million in cash and around $211.2 million in US Treasuries and short-duration money-market instruments backing the roughly $468 million circulating supply.
Open Standard says reserve attestations will be published monthly.
That structure is intended to maintain the stablecoin’s one-dollar value while generating income from the reserve assets supporting the tokens.
But unlike traditional models where much of that reserve income remains with the issuer, Open Standard plans to distribute much of the economic benefit back to partners that help increase OUSD circulation and activity.
More Than 200 Companies Are Already Part of the Network
Open Standard initially emerged in June with more than 140 partners.
That network has since grown beyond 200 organizations, spanning banks, fintech companies, technology groups and financial institutions.
Recent participants include UBS, Japan’s SBI Holdings and fintech company Jeeves.
The scale of that network matters because stablecoins benefit heavily from network effects.
Creating a token technically is relatively straightforward. Convincing banks, merchants, exchanges, payment processors, fintech companies and consumers to accept and use it is considerably harder.
Open Standard is attempting to solve that problem before OUSD reaches scale by giving the companies responsible for distribution a direct financial stake in its growth.
The Real Competition Is With USDT and USDC
OUSD enters a stablecoin industry still overwhelmingly dominated by two names: Tether’s USDT and Circle’s USDC.
Together, the two account for close to 90% of global stablecoin supply.
That creates a formidable barrier for any new entrant.
Liquidity, exchange availability, trust and integrations reinforce themselves as a stablecoin becomes larger, making it difficult for competitors to persuade businesses to move to another token.
Open USD is attempting to challenge that advantage through distribution rather than simply technology.
Its founding group already includes companies responsible for enormous volumes of payments, e-commerce and digital asset transactions.
Perhaps most notably, Coinbase and Visa have both played important roles in expanding USDC’s reach, but are now shareholders in an organization launching a competing dollar stablecoin.
That makes OUSD more than another token entering an increasingly crowded market.
The Battle Is Shifting From Issuing Stablecoins to Distributing Them
The arrival of Open USD points toward a broader shift in digital money.
The first phase of stablecoin competition largely revolved around who could issue the most trusted dollar-backed token and build the deepest liquidity.
The next phase could increasingly be about distribution.
Payment processors, card networks, exchanges, banks, fintech platforms and e-commerce companies already control the channels through which businesses and consumers move money.
Open Standard is effectively offering those distributors a piece of the economics traditionally captured by the stablecoin issuer.
If that model succeeds, the significance of OUSD will not simply be whether its circulating supply climbs from $468 million to several billion dollars.
The bigger question is whether Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe and Visa can use their enormous existing networks to turn a newly launched stablecoin into everyday financial infrastructure — and in doing so challenge the dominance of USDT and USDC with a fundamentally different business model.