Stablecoin-based cards could soon account for double-digit percentages of all cards in some Latin American markets, said John Timoney, head of strategic partnerships at Rain, a payments infrastructure platform.
Spending on retail stablecoin cards has increased about 105% to 106% over the past year, Timoney said during a panel at Consensus Miami 2026. The cards are physical or virtual, allowing users to spend stablecoins such as Tether. and USD Coin (USDC) directly from a digital wallet for everyday purchases.
Rain provides stablecoin infrastructure to card issuers and recently became a master member of Mastercard, allowing it to offer credit and prepaid cards on the Mastercard network. Rain and Mastercard are also exploring on-chain settlement for certain card program feeds using regulated stablecoins.
The company isn’t trying to replace card networks, Timoney said. It attempts to make stable balances usable through existing networks that already reach merchants around the world.
“Over the decades, card networks have attracted hundreds of millions of merchants,” Timoney said. “Rain explicitly didn’t want to reinvent the wheel.”
Spending patterns are also increasingly difficult to distinguish from ordinary card activities, he said. Stablecoin card users spend across typical merchant categories, including large global merchants and everyday purchases.
“There’s nothing very remarkable about it,” Timoney said. “And I think that’s what’s remarkable.”
Despite their growth, stablecoin cards account for less than 1% of global card spending, Ray Hernandez, senior vice president of business development at Consensys, said on the same panel.
Crypto Card Adoption
Latin America has become one of the most favorable markets for adoption, Timoney added. Stablecoin cards are used in custodial and non-custodial wallets, crypto exchanges, and products that abstract users’ stablecoin experience.
The trader still receives fiat in many of these transactions. This separates card-based stablecoin spending from direct crypto-push payments, where merchants may need to more directly manage crypto settlement, volatility and transaction risk.
Perhaps the biggest change is behind the scenes. Rain claims that stablecoin settlement allows card schemes to set up on weekends and holidays, reducing trapped capital by more than 40% in some cases.
Traditional card programs often must pre-fund network obligations or borrow from networks when banking rails are closed. Stablecoins can be moved outside of bank cut-off hours.
This can make rewards and card economics more flexible, Timoney said. Capital that would otherwise remain idle can be used elsewhere in the business.
Mastercard has delved deeper into stable payments. Earlier this year, Binance, PayPal and Ripple joined Mastercard’s broader blockchain payments push. The push saw the payments giant agree to buy stablecoin infrastructure company BVNK for up to $1.8 billion.
Christian Rau, senior vice president of digital assets and blockchain at Mastercard, said mainstream adoption will depend on making the technology invisible to consumers.
“Other than the people in this room, no one says ‘oh, I just made a blockchain payment,’” Rau said. “Nowadays, the normal reference is you have a card on your iPhone or an Android. You tap it, the money is gone.”
The consumer pitch is not on-chain payments, he added. This is the ability to spend any asset in real time, with the network protections that users already expect.
Hernandez said the next step depends on easier on-ramps, abstract network fees and more local payment infrastructure. Today’s crypto card users are still mostly crypto-native consumers who already hold on-chain assets.
MetaMask is expanding its card strategy around self-custody, Hernandez said. The MetaMask card, developed with Mastercard and Baanx, allows users to spend from a self-custodial wallet while assets are converted to fiat currency at the time of purchase.
“If all we do is replicate the Apple Pay experience, I think we’ll be fine, but I don’t think we’ll overtake it,” Hernandez said.
Pay in crypto
This view prompted a challenge from GoMining CEO Mark Zalan, who argued that stablecoins and card infrastructure add unnecessary intermediaries to crypto payments.
Zalan said users want to keep bitcoin in their own custody and spend it without converting it to stablecoins or relying on exit ramps. He described the conversion layers and payment intermediaries as “little helpers” who charge small fees on each transaction.
“Protection is another word for rent-seeking,” Zalan said, referring to consumer protections built into card transactions.
Timoney countered, saying payments aren’t just money movements. Card networks also manage chargebacks, merchant risks, and other protections that consumers and merchants have come to expect.
Rau made a similar point. Most consumers have been “socialized with deposit insurance” and chargeback protection, he said.
“Payment is not just about moving money from point A to point B,” Rau said. “From a consumer perspective, the payment experience is about interoperability, safety and security.”
