Woah. 😳 Cash App just announced stablecoin support launching early 2025. Not Bitcoin. Stablecoins.
Starting early next year, Cash App's 58 million users will be able to send and receive stablecoins directly in the app.
Some thoughts 🧵
- Each user gets a blockchain address
- Stablecoins sent to that address automatically convert to dollars
- Dollars sent out convert to stablecoins on-chain
Chain and coin-agnostic at launch.
Not saying which stablecoins or blockchains, but "follow customer demand, not maximalism."
Are they walking back from being Bitcoin Maxi's?
Launches alongside Bitcoin Lightning payments and AI features.
But here's the buried lede:
"If I were founding Cash App today, I would build it on stablecoin rails natively."
Miles Suter, Cash App's Bitcoin Product Lead
So. They're supporting Bitcoin.
They're supporting Lightning.
They're supporting stablecoins.
Slowly walking back the Bitcoin Maximalist world view?
When a product leader says "if I were starting today,"
Yet given what Cash App does, that makes sense.
Stablecoins are the ideal P2P payments infrastructure.
Traditional payment apps are built on banking rails:
- ACH for transfers
- Card networks for merchant payments,
- Correspondent banking for cross-border.
Stablecoins bypass all of it.
Cash App sees stablecoins as an alternative settlement layer that's cheaper and faster than the infrastructure they built on.
Every major payments company is making the same infrastructure bet: stablecoins are becoming a settlement layer, not just a crypto product.
Three things to watch:
1. Which stablecoins at launch?
- USDC signals follow the market pattern.
- Launching their own is a new reevenue model
2. What's the fee structure?
- Free P2P transfers mean they're replacing internal rails.
- Fees mean it's a feature add-on.
Remember: Instant payments is a major revenue line for Cash App today...
3. What's the custody model. Self-custody or hosted?
- This reveals whether they're building on-chain or
- Wrapping blockchain in familiar UX.
The product announcement is about adding stablecoins.
But the strategy isn't clear.
- PayPal and Venmo has PYUSD
- The banks have EWS and Zelle who may do a stablecoin
- Cash App actually looks like a follower here not a leader
But their execution is what matters.
There's a gap in the market for the onchain, global Cash App.
Why not Cash App itself?
@AlexH_Johnson @jevgenijs
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