Stabledash Live · · 26 min
Why Western Union and SoFi Want Their Own Stablecoins, and What It Changes for Remittances
With 
Maya Caddle
Key takeaways
Maya Caddle says Western Union handles about $1 trillion in total payments volume a year, and she calls remittance companies the most obvious fit for stablecoins.
Citing figures Western Union disclosed, Caddle says its USDPT stablecoin cuts its cost of capital from roughly 5% to 2% or slightly below.
Caddle says not everyone needs its own stablecoin, and the first question for any issuer, including SoFi, is whether it has distribution in its own right.
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0:00Solana's payments lead works with major remittance companies and SoFi1 of 8
Summary
Maya Caddle of the Solana Foundation says a company's own stablecoin can cut the cost of moving money across borders, but only issuers that have their own distribution should launch one.
Western Union alone handles about $1 trillion in total payments volume a year, according to Maya Caddle, head of payment partnerships at the Solana Foundation. On Stabledash Live, she used that figure to explain why remittance companies want stablecoins of their own and how that changes what it costs them to move money.
Who Caddle works with
Caddle says she spends much of her time at the Solana Foundation with large traditional players, among them Moneygram, Western Union, the remittance company Zepz and SoFi. SoFi has announced SoFiUSD and plans to build it into its platform for both institutional and retail customers.
“The benefit of having your own stablecoin for remittance companies is that they could earn even when that's in flight. They can earn no matter where that stablecoin is in the world because they're still earning from the reserve revenue. They're still getting a pocket of NIM And and also reduces... Heavily reduces their need for prefunding because it's instant money move.”
Maya CaddleWhy remittances fit
Caddle says remittance companies may be the clearest fit for stablecoins because they have to move money across borders all the time. In her view, a company's own stablecoin lets it keep earning reserve revenue while money is in flight, wherever the coin sits in the world. Because transfers are instant, it also reduces how much cash the company has to prefund in other countries.
The USDPT numbers
Western Union has launched its own stablecoin, USDPT, and shared some figures in a webinar with the Foundation, Caddle says. Counting prefunding, the company found its cost of capital was about 5% of the money it moved. With its own stablecoin and most of the reserve revenue, she says, that falls to 2% or slightly below, depending on Fed rates.
Caddle says lending against payment flows, offered by a sister company of Huma Finance, is a growing segment that can help cover the prefunding stablecoins do not remove.
Not everyone needs a coin
Caddle says many companies benefit from launching a stablecoin, but not all of them need one. For SoFi and any other issuer, she says the first question is whether it has distribution in its own right. In what she called her personal hypothesis, she said a bank launching a stablecoin or tokenized deposit should aim to become one of the anchor currencies that new stablecoins are built on.
Caddle presents the Solana Foundation as a place for payments businesses to build. She says Solana is winning in institutional finance and payments, and notes that the CEO of Franklin Templeton called it the only real institutional chain or one of the key ones. The Foundation has also hired Rachel as its chief strategy officer.
SoFi, Solana Foundation, Agora, and Western Union come up most.
- People
- Jamal
- Rachel Myers
- Drew Rogers
- Maya Caddle
- Companies
- SoFi
- Solana Foundation
- Agora
- Western Union
- Huma Finance
- Moneygram
- Franklin Templeton
- ARF
- Rain
- Silvergate
- Zepz
- Anchorage Digital
- Circle
- Dfns
