Author: Chloe, ChainCatcher
Visa announced its third-quarter 2026 earnings, reporting net revenue of $11.6 billion, a 14% year-over-year increase, and payment volume surpassing $4 trillion for the first time in the company’s history. However, what truly drew intense market scrutiny was the company’s statement regarding stablecoins during the earnings call.
Visa announces its participation in the Open Standard Alliance and support for the new stablecoin OpenUSD, while emphasizing its continued commitment to a multi-currency, multi-chain strategy. Examining Visa’s stablecoin platform structure, controversies surrounding OpenUSD Alliance members, and concentration data in the stablecoin market, we explore what Visa is truly positioning itself for.
Key insights behind the financial report
On July 28, 2026, Visa announced its third-quarter 2026 financial results. Net revenue reached $11.6 billion, and earnings per share were $3.32, both exceeding company expectations, according to CEO Ryan McInerney. On a constant currency basis, payment volume increased by 10% year-over-year, and the number of processed transactions also rose by 10% to 72 billion. Cross-border transactions, payment volume, and processed transactions all maintained double-digit growth, with cross-border transactions remaining Visa’s highest-margin segment.
The other side of the earnings report isn’t as pretty. Visa also disclosed ongoing job cuts, primarily in its technology and product teams, with a GAAP severance charge of $563 million for the quarter. The company simultaneously repurchased $4.9 billion in stock and paid out $1.3 billion in dividends. While it raised its full-year outlook, the reallocated resources are clearly directed toward three areas: AI, stablecoins, and agency commerce.
In other words, this is a financial report that trades layoffs for investment capacity; what truly matters is where the cut resources are being redirected.
From the blockchain to the application layer, Visa has positioned itself as the foundation for stablecoins.
On the earnings call, Visa described its approach to stablecoins as end-to-end. The company stated that it is invested at every layer of the stablecoin ecosystem—from blockchain and issuance to wallets, infrastructure, and applications—with this quarter’s progress focused on the issuance and application layers. On the issuance side, Visa joined the Open Standard Alliance, which plans to launch OpenUSD—a new stablecoin designed for global capital flows.
What is the Visa stablecoin platform actually selling?
The application side is Visa’s Stablecoin Platform (VSP). This product was launched in mid-July and is designed to enable financial institutions, fintech companies, and crypto-native organizations to access stablecoin capabilities—including deposits, custody, and redemptions—through a Visa-managed environment, initially supporting OUSD. The earnings call further expanded on the full feature set: the platform allows partners to settle with Visa using stablecoins, access blockchain wallet-as-a-service infrastructure, and transfer funds between fiat currency and stablecoins.
Pismo and the subtle thread of tokenized deposits
Less discussed than stablecoins is another branch: Visa stated that the platform will integrate with payment infrastructure company Pismo to support tokenized deposits for financial institutions, with future plans to introduce third-party tokenized deposit infrastructure providers.
Tokenized deposits and stablecoins are technically similar but fundamentally different in financial structure: one is an on-chain representation of bank liabilities, the other is a monetary substitute issued by non-bank entities. Visa is positioned to serve both sides, leaving room in both the banking and crypto systems. Whichever side wins, it has already bet on it.
VISA's Pricing Power Statement
During the earnings call, analysts directly asked the most pointed question: Will OpenUSD compete with established issuers like Circle and Tether?
McInerney’s response was that Visa will continue to maintain a multi-currency, multi-chain approach, and the company’s role is not to pick winners. He added that stablecoins have not yet achieved widespread scale beyond a few use cases, one of which that has already emerged is the U Card.
The stablecoin market is highly concentrated: as of the end of July 2026, the total market capitalization of stablecoins was approximately $303.2 billion, with USDT accounting for $184.2 billion and USDC for $73.4 billion, while the overall market cap contracted slightly by 3.3% over the past 90 days. In a market with stagnant total volume where two issuers control the vast majority of circulating supply, any new entrant would face extremely high costs to gain market share on its own. But if you don’t issue coins and instead focus only on settlement, exchange, and wallet services, it doesn’t matter who holds the largest share—because every transaction in and out must pass through Visa.
140 founding partners, yet some companies only learned they were part of it through the news.
ARK analyst Lorenzo Valente, in an X post on July 29, argued that the commitments from OUSD partners are increasingly resembling a letter of intent rather than a strategic bet. He emphasized that supporting OUSD is entirely different from genuinely investing in distribution channels, balance sheets, and resources to ensure its success.
This claim is grounded in facts. OUSD is backed by a founding consortium of over 140 companies spanning payments, banking, technology, and crypto, including Visa, Mastercard, Stripe, BlackRock, BNY, Standard Chartered, Google, Shopify, Coinbase, and Ripple. Zach Abrams, CEO of Bridge, a subsidiary of Stripe, serves as the founding CEO of Open Standard. Its differentiated design features three key aspects: zero-cost minting and redemption, no cap on issuance volume, and nearly all reserve yields—after management fees—are returned to partners. The token is expected to launch in late 2026, with Solana as its initial blockchain.
The issue lies with the list itself. Shortly after its release, a series of denials emerged: Samsung stated it had not engaged in formal discussions with Open Standard and was unclear about its role in the alliance; Dunamu, Shinhan Bank, and K Bank said they had been contacted but had not approved participation, with some companies only learning of their inclusion through media reports. The same article also noted that Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire criticized the consortium-based stablecoin model as inherently prone to failure.
More notably absent from the list are the three largest USD stablecoin issuers: Circle, Tether, and PayPal. An alliance that excludes the current market leaders and includes members who have publicly denied participation is too early to claim it represents industry consensus. It resembles more of a collective statement of观望.
Visa’s signature on this list and its statement during the earnings call, “We don’t pick winners,” are two sides of the same coin.
Those who don't pick winners are betting on the channel itself.
Does Visa's entry into OpenUSD pose a threat to Circle and Tether?
Not in the short term. A coalition without exclusive commitments, whose members are still denying their involvement, poses relatively low threat; on the other hand, from Visa’s perspective, the cost of this signature is extremely low, while it gains a position and voice in the stablecoin narrative without assuming responsibility for any outcomes—it’s an option, not a bet.
Over the long term, the only real variable is when Visa will begin directing its merchant network and issuer relationships toward a specific stablecoin. Until then, no matter how intense the competition among issuers, Visa remains an observer—so for Visa, it doesn’t matter which winner emerges; what matters is that the winner ultimately routes its transactions through Visa, thereby securing control of the channel itself.