State of Stablecoins and Payments

Stablecoin payments are showing real adoption, growing 45% to $482B while supply grew only 0.4% through September.

Allium's Q3 2026 report measures stablecoin supply, adjusted volume, payments, agentic payments and card spend through September 30, 2026, with commentary from 17 industry contributors. Supply grew 0.4% this year to $305B, while payments grew 45% to $482B as payment count rose 71% and the average payment fell. By Elton Shehdula, Head of Research @Allium Maksym Sherman, Research @Allium Olivia Denk, Research @Allium

Oct 15, 2026

Stablecoins & Payments

Stablecoins

Payments

Authors

Key takeaways

Stablecoin payments grew 45% to $482B through September while supply grew 0.4%. Payment count rose 71% to 1.04B and the average payment fell from $544 to $462, so growth came from more frequent, smaller payments. Third-quarter payment value grew 51% on a year earlier, and September set a monthly high of $72B.
Supply growth shifted away from the issuers that drove 2025. Supply at Tether, Circle and Ethena fell this year while other issuers added a net $6.9B, and 15 issuers now hold more than $1B, up from 11. Issuers are competing on distribution: Open USD reached $799M in the two weeks after its September 30 launch, and branded stablecoins backed by USDC and PYUSD reached $872M.
Agents and cards are new routes into stablecoin spending, still small in value. Agent payments doubled to 68.3M in Q3 while their value slipped to $3.7M, and stablecoin card spend grew 10x to $3.9B.

Abstract

Stablecoin supply ended September at $305B, 0.4% above the start of the year, while the activity running through it kept growing. Adjusted volume, Allium's measure of end-user transfers, rose 48% to $2.4T from January to September, and payments, one-fifth of that, rose 45% to $482B.

The report separates recorded transfer value from end-user activity. Of $97.9T in raw stablecoin transfers, screens for exchange, DeFi, infrastructure, automated and mint and burn flows leave 2.5% as adjusted volume. Each remaining transfer is assigned one use by rules run in a fixed order, and payments are typed by sender and receiver as consumer or business. Tron settled two-thirds of payment value and USDT 84%.

Distribution is now where issuers compete. Open USD shares reserve income with the partners that bring it supply, and companies such as Polymarket and Jupiter issue their own stablecoins backed by existing ones, mainly USDC and PYUSD, while agents and cards open newer routes into spending. Commentary from 17 contributors, including Visa, Stripe, Coinbase, Citizens and Moody's, sets out where they see the next phase.

Download the full report for section-by-section data and methodology.

Informational only. Not investment advice.