Visa joins BLOOM initiative: A new cross-border payments stack is taking shape

The cross-border payments stack is being “unbundled”

Corporate treasurers looking out across global commerce would be forgiven for thinking they see the signs of a new cross-border financial stack taking shape. And in fact, they might be right.

Visa joined the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s BLOOM initiative on August 25, adding another global payments heavyweight to an experiment designed to connect traditional payment systems with stablecoin-based settlement rails. Participants already include DBS, OCBC, UOB, Partior, Circle, and Stripe. Visa’s plans include testing settlement using regulated dollar- and euro-denominated stablecoins, exploring whether institutions can settle seven days a week rather than around the banking calendar.

Also on Tuesday, OpenPayd integrated its universal financial infrastructure with Circle Payments Network (CPN), enabling businesses to make near-instant cross-border fiat payments. Meanwhile, Project Agorá is testing tokenized commercial bank deposits against tokenized central bank reserves across currencies. Project Pangea is exploring real-time stablecoin-based FX settlement between Europe and Korea, while Qivalis now brings together 37 European banks behind a regulated euro stablecoin.

The cross-border stablecoin question becomes an interoperability question

A multinational doesn’t ultimately care whether the technology underneath a $20 million supplier payment is intellectually elegant. It cares whether value can move from the company’s bank in New York to a supplier’s account in Seoul at the right time, in the right currency, with final settlement, regulatory certainty, sufficient liquidity, and usable transaction information.

That requires more than issuing a token. It requires conversion, FX, compliance, liquidity, settlement, and connectivity. Visa’s arrival to the BLOOM project pushes the question one step further: what happens when a global network built around conventional payments becomes a bridge into tokenized settlement rather than being replaced by it?

Project Pangea offers another useful clue. The initiative is testing whether foreign exchange between stablecoin ecosystems can move from today’s settlement model toward T+0. The real bottleneck in cross-border digital money appears when one digital currency needs to become another. The commercial value for multinational treasury emerges when digital euros can become digital dollars without recreating the same FX, liquidity, and settlement frictions that exist in correspondent banking today.

The new stack is unbundling across corridors

The emerging landscape suggests that functions bundled together inside correspondent banking may begin separating into distinct competitive layers. In an operational sense, the cross-border payment may become less a product itself than an orchestrated sequence of financial services.

According to PYMNTS Intelligence, while traditional banks remain the dominant provider for international payments, fintech companies are steadily expanding their role by combining faster digital experiences with services designed for businesses navigating global trade. Rather than replacing banks, many small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) appear to be building a broader payments toolkit as international commerce becomes more common.

However, most CFOs remain cautious

PYMNTS Intelligence’s report “Waiting for Certainty: Why Most CFOs Are Holding Back on Crypto and Stablecoins” shows that most middle market companies remain cautious about digital assets. Usage is limited, with 13% of firms using stablecoins and 5% employing other cryptocurrencies.

For Vietnamese export businesses — especially those trading with Japanese and American partners — this development brings both opportunities and challenges. Opportunity: faster, cheaper payments. Challenge: the need to understand and adapt to the new infrastructure taking shape.

Lessons for Vietnamese and Japanese businesses

For Vietnamese businesses: Fintechs and banks are competing to provide better cross-border payment solutions. Businesses should evaluate both options — traditional banks and fintechs — rather than sticking with a single channel.

For Japanese businesses: With MAS’s leading role in the region, initiatives like BLOOM could create more efficient payment corridors between Japan and ASEAN. Japanese companies exporting to Southeast Asia should closely monitor this development.

Stablecoins are no longer “crypto”: As Visa, Circle, and major banks join regulated stablecoins, the boundary between “crypto” and “traditional finance” is blurring. This is a signal that tokenized money will become part of mainstream financial infrastructure.

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Source: Banks and FinTechs Are Unbundling the Cross-Border Stack to Win Over CFOs — PYMNTS, August 26, 2026