Stablecoins are moving beyond cryptocurrency trading desks into real-world payments, but the convenience comes at a cost.
New data from Artemis, the New York-based blockchain analytics firm, shows rapid growth in stablecoin payments across sectors, even as fees often match or exceed those of traditional finance.
Summary
- Artemis reports $136 billion in stablecoin payments from 33 companies between January 2023 and August 2025, with B2B transactions amounting to $76 billion annually.
- Tether’s USDT dominates 85% of the stablecoin market, primarily on the Tron blockchain, followed by USDC.
- Stablecoin payments face high fees, especially on exchanges, and remain small compared to traditional financial systems, and blockchain congestion further increases costs.
Sagebrush respondent 22 stablecoin payment companies and complementary estimates from 11 others, attributing $136 billion in stablecoin transactions between January 2023 and August 2025, with an annualized run rate of $122 billion. In terms of activity:
- B2B payments lead the pack ($76 billion annualized)
- Peer to Peer ($19 billion)
- Card-linked ($18 billion)
- B2C ($3.3 billion)
- Pre-financing ($3.6 billion).
Tether’s USDT dominates with 85% of the volume, followed by Circle’s USDC, mainly on Tron, Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain and Polygon.
Stablecoin Evolution
Artemis co-founder Anthony Yim and data scientist Andrew Van Aken note that stablecoins have evolved from trading tools to a mainstream payment method. Large firms such as Visa, Mastercard, PayPal and Stripe are integrating them.
The data set is touted as the most comprehensive to date, covering 33 companies and representing the majority of emerging stablecoin payments volume.
But the growth has a downside: While peer-to-peer transfers on efficient blockchains like Solana can cost fractions of a cent, exchange and conversion fees (including trading fees, network transfers, and currency spreads) can quickly erode that advantage.
Shark Tank judge Kevin O’Leary recently highlighted X’s weak point: Ethereum network congestion caused fees to top $1,000 for small transactions, underscoring persistent cost challenges.
“That’s like paying a thousand-dollar toll to drive on a one-lane highway,” he said. “This proves what I’ve been saying for years: When real traffic hits the system, it cracks under pressure.”
O’Leary added:
“For over a decade we’ve talked about getting on the chain, and now that it’s finally being adopted in the real world, the cracks are showing. Innovation isn’t just about hype or speculation, it’s about building infrastructure that can actually handle scale.”
Stablecoin regulation, conflicts of interest
The report comes months after President Donald Trump signed the Genius Act, which established a federal framework for stablecoin issuers. Critics say it did little to address consumer protection or conflicts of interest.
For example, Trump and his family control about 60% of World Liberty Financial, a crypto company that launched its own stablecoin, USD1. The company recently gained momentum when a $2 billion investment fund in the United Arab Emirates used $1 to acquire a stake in Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
This week, Trump forgiven Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, who served prison time after failing to prevent criminal money movement activity on his platform.
As with other stablecoins, $1 is pegged to fixed assets, such as the US dollar, allowing issuers to generate profits through collecting interest on Treasury bonds and other reserves backing the token.
Still, Artemis’ findings illustrate that stablecoin payments are increasing across commercial and consumer channels, despite remaining small compared to traditional systems.
