The Week in Charts

Stablecoins find their niche

Banking
Financial services

Stablecoins are grabbing attention, with reported transactions up to $35 trillion annually. But most of these transactions are trading, internal transfers, and automated processes, not real-world payments. A joint analysis by McKinsey and Artemis Analytics reveals that actual stablecoin payments in 2025 totaled $390 billion, or 0.02 percent of global payments. B2B transactions comprise the largest portion of stablecoin payment activity, totaling $226 billion, Partner Matt Higginson and coauthors note. Although overall market penetration is low, stablecoin transactions are growing in both consumer-to-consumer and consumer-to-business use cases.

Stablecoins account for a tiny share of traditional payment volumes across categories, but usage is growing quickly.
Image description: A tree map shows annualized stablecoin payment volumes totaling $390 billion across four categories: business-to-business (B2B) payments at $226 billion represent the largest segment; consumer-to-consumer (C2C) at $77 billion; consumer-to-business (C2B) at $76 billion; and business-to-consumer (B2C) at $11 billion. A bar chart on the right displays market penetration rates: C2C leads at 0.37%, followed by C2B at 0.11%, while B2B and B2C each show 0.01% penetration, with an overall market penetration of 0.02%. Note: This image description was completed with the assistance of Writer, a gen AI tool. Source: Artemis Analytics; McKinsey Global Payments Map. End of image description.

To read the article, see “Stablecoins in payments: What the raw transaction numbers miss,” February 18, 2026.