Author: Gu Yu, ChainCatcher
On June 26, the tokenized finance settlement network Metal announced the completion of its seed round, led by cross-border payment giant Airwallex and its fund Capital49.
This investment has drawn attention not only because Airwallex is a leading fintech company in global cross-border payments, but also because its founder, Jack Zhang, was one of the most vocal critics of stablecoins just a year ago.
In June last year, Jack Zhang publicly stated that stablecoins cannot reduce the cost of remittances between major currencies, and that cryptocurrencies have not demonstrated clear real-world use cases over the past 15 years. In his view, if users ultimately still need to receive euros, pounds, or other fiat currencies in their bank accounts, the cost of converting out of stablecoins into local currency may be higher than that of the traditional interbank foreign exchange market. This sparked strong rebuttals from leaders in the crypto industry.
A year ago’s “watching from the sidelines” contrasts sharply with today’s “heavy investment,” reflecting the fundamental consensus reached by global traditional financial giants in 2026 regarding Crypto’s infiltration: you may remain bearish on hype narratives, but you cannot reject the generational revolution in clearing efficiency brought by stablecoins and tokenized networks.
What is Metal?
To understand Jack Zhang's change in attitude, first understand what Metal aims to do.
According to public information, Metal is a global settlement network and Layer-1 blockchain designed for tokenized finance, natively supporting AI agent trading, with built-in identity verification (KYC) and permission authorization systems, offering institutional-grade compliance and privacy.
It aims not only at stablecoin payments but also to enable tokenized settlement for all financial products such as stocks, bonds, and funds, serving institutional trading markets worth trillions of dollars.
On the team side, Metal’s co-founder Loong Wang was the founder of the renowned cross-chain protocol Ren Protocol and brings deep technical expertise in distributed systems and on-chain settlement; the other co-founder, Catherine Porter, previously served as the Global Partnerships Lead for Meta’s globally impactful Libra project (later renamed Diem).
Through this investment, Airwallex will introduce tokenized financial products to its payment network, including not only stablecoins but also tokenized bank deposits, money market funds, securities, and a range of other assets.
Airwallex's core capabilities include global accounts, local collections, foreign exchange, corporate payments, and cross-border clearing. If Metal provides an on-chain settlement layer, Airwallex can offer fiat channels, enterprise customers, compliance interfaces, and global payment scenarios.
This month, Airwallex announced the completion of its $320 million Series H funding round, with its valuation surging to $11 billion, well-capitalized and planning to build an AI-native financial operating system.
This is indeed a win-win strategic investment and partnership, common in the business world, but uniquely notable in that Airwallex’s founders were criticizing cryptocurrencies and stablecoins just a year ago.
II. Jack Zhang still holds his ground
In June 2025, Jack Zhang posted on X, "Investors always ask me about stablecoins and how they can reduce foreign exchange fees; but if you're sending money from USD to EUR and the recipient still requires euros in their bank account, I really don't see how stablecoins can lower costs—the expense of converting out of a stablecoin into the recipient currency far exceeds that of the traditional interbank foreign exchange market."
"Cryptocurrency has always been a field I couldn't understand. Over the past 15 years, I still haven't seen where cryptocurrency has genuinely provided benefits. Even stablecoins, with their lower volatility, don't seem to offer any advantages in B2B transactions, except perhaps in some very niche currency markets—but those markets themselves have extremely low liquidity," continued Jack Zhang.
At the time, many industry leaders in the crypto space engaged in heated debates, continuously promoting the real-world applications and value of stablecoins, but Jack Zhang remained unconvinced and stood by his position. At that time, most viewed his stance as “a defense by entrenched interests in traditional finance”—Airwallex’s core advantage lies in its licenses across countries and its global funds pool, making the rise of stablecoins a natural threat to its business model.
Today, Jack Zhang is demonstrating through his actions that his views on stablecoins are evolving. However, in response to the wave of mockery from crypto users, he specifically emphasized that his stance on cryptocurrencies has not changed, and that stablecoins are not cryptocurrencies.
“Stablecoins are currencies tokenized on a blockchain, and unlike cryptocurrencies, they are backed 1:1 by underlying reserve assets, making them fundamentally different from unsupported crypto tokens,” Jack Zhang responded today to a sarcastic comment from Dragonfly investor Omar Kanji.
Regardless, this is still good news for stablecoins and the crypto payments space.
Three: Stablecoins and crypto payments are being rapidly adopted by mainstream systems
Airwallex's investment in Metal is not an isolated case; traditional financial institutions have been competing to enter the stablecoin payments space over the past year.
Stripe acquired Bridge and Privy to strengthen its infrastructure for stablecoin payments and wallets; Mastercard acquired BVNK to enter the stablecoin enterprise payments space; and major banks such as JPMorgan, Citi, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo are reportedly planning to launch tokenized networks to compete with crypto companies on 24/7 settlement. a16z views these moves as a signal that finance is crossing the tipping point in its migration on-chain.
Meanwhile, the stance of traditional financial leaders is also changing.
JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon has long been skeptical of cryptocurrency, but after JPMorgan launched JPMD, a dollar-denominated deposit token for institutional payments, he acknowledged that stablecoins are “real” and stated that JPMorgan must participate to understand their evolution.
Cuy Sheffield, Visa’s head of crypto, holds a view closer to Jack Zhang’s revised version: stablecoins may not displace card networks in U.S. retail payments, but they can enable access to U.S. dollars and modern financial tools in emerging markets such as Latin America, Africa, and Asia-Pacific.
These cases collectively show that stablecoins are being redefined by traditional finance. They are no longer just a dollar substitute on exchanges, but a common interface for corporate finance, cross-border payments, on-chain assets, bank deposits, and dollar liquidity.
For Airwallex, stablecoins are no longer just a theoretical question of “whether they’re useful,” but a strategic question of “whether to claim a position.”
If stablecoins continue to grow, enterprise customers may soon need not only traditional multi-currency accounts but also stablecoin accounts; not only local bank collections but also on-chain USD settlements.
This will reshape the competitive landscape for payment companies. In the past, payment companies competed on licenses, local banking networks, foreign exchange costs, and API capabilities. In the future, they will also need to compete on stablecoin settlement, on-chain compliance, wallet infrastructure, and on-chain liquidity management.
So Airwallex’s investment in Metal isn’t a sudden leap into crypto faith—it’s buying a seat at a new table. It can continue questioning the cost-effectiveness of stablecoins within G10 currency corridors, but it cannot ignore the structural opportunities stablecoins offer in emerging markets, corporate finance, and on-chain settlements.
A year ago, Jack Zhang asked: What is the point of stablecoins?
A year later, Airwallex’s lead investment in Metal answered the question: at the very least, it was worth investing in—don’t stand on the sidelines watching.