Lloyds, Visa settle $750,000 using USDC in live cross-border pilot

What happened

Lloyds used USDC, a digital dollar stablecoin, to settle $750,000 of payment obligations with Visa during a seven-day live cross-border pilot.

Confirmed

Global impact / market context

If banks settle cross-border payments with stablecoins instead of slow traditional systems, companies could receive export and supplier payments faster, change how much cash they hold, and shift fee revenue away from legacy payment networks.

Analyst inference

This pilot tests whether dollar-backed tokens like USDC can handle real bank-to-card-network settlement. For investors in payment and banking stocks, it signals possible disruption to cross-border fee income and positions USDC as financial plumbing.

Analyst inference

What to watch

1. Whether Lloyds and Visa run further USDC settlement pilots beyond this seven-day test, because repeat use would show the first trial met internal payment and risk standards. Confirmed
2. Watch for any announced expansion of USDC settlement to more currencies, corridors, or counterparties, since that would change cross-border revenue and cash-management needs for affected firms. Proposed
3. Track whether other banks adopt similar stablecoin settlement, as that could pressure traditional correspondent banking fees and alter investor views on payment network and bank profitability. Analyst inference

Affected assets

• USDC — USD Coin
• DFI — DeFiChain

Evidence

• theblock.co