A consortium of more than 140 financial and technology companies, including Visa, Mastercard, Stripe and Coinbase, launched a new stablecoin , called Open USD. The venture, which is managed by an independent company called Open Standard, aims to challenge the dominance of Circle and Tether in the stablecoin space.
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Open USD, which trades under the symbol OUSD, allows businesses to create and redeem the token at no cost and without volume restrictions. One major difference lies in the reserves.
The bulk of the interest earned on the assets backing OUSD will be distributed to partners after a management fee, rather than being concentrated in a single issuer. This structure undermines the traditional model, where income from reserves—interest on cash and government bonds held against a stablecoin—made up the bulk of Circle’s revenue last year.
The list of backers includes big players from Wall Street and Silicon Valley, including BlackRock, BNY, Standard Chartered, Ripple, Google and Shopify. Zach Abrams, co-founder and CEO of infrastructure company Bridge, which is owned by Stripe, will serve as the founding CEO of Open Standard. “Existing stablecoins have great strengths, but to be used at scale, businesses need something that is open, low-cost, high-performance, widely accessible and aligned with their interests,” Abrams said during the presentation.
The Open Standard board is comprised of consortium partners, promoting a governance model that is collective rather than controlled by a single entity. Markets reacted quickly to the presentation, with Circle shares falling sharply on the day of the announcement, with reports indicating a drop of between 15 and 17 percent.
The impact is amplified by the fact that some of OUSD’s backers, including BlackRock and BNY, are also key partners in Circle’s ecosystem, effectively bringing well-known institutional investors to a competing platform. However, the competitive landscape is challenging. Tether’s USDT accounted for about 62 percent of the stablecoin market in April, while Circle’s USDC held about 25 percent, according to data from CoinDesk.
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Analysts have warned that the market reaction may have been premature. A researcher at Ark Invest expressed skepticism about Open USD’s ability to displace Circle, saying that the incumbent’s distribution advantages are difficult to replicate. The launch comes in a distinctly different regulatory environment. The GENIUS, signed into law in the US in July 2025, established a federal framework for payment stablecoins, making it easier for new players to enter.
This framework has transformed the sector from a niche cryptocurrency market into a competitive space for enterprise payment solutions. The participation of the two largest card networks underscores the seriousness with which the incumbents are approaching this space. For Visa and Mastercard, this move aligns with a broader diversification strategy. Mastercard’s recent acquisition of stablecoin company BVNK for up to $1.8 billion indicates the lengths to which these networks are willing to go to secure a share of tokenized settlement.
Institutional interest is growing, with banks grappling with a trust gap with big tech and Wall Street scrambling to tokenize assets, as seen with JPMorgan’s tokenized money market fund on Ethereum. Open Standard has not set a firm launch date beyond 2026, but the token is expected to launch later this year.
Whether OUSD will emerge as a significant competitor or simply act as a lever against Circle's pricing remains to be seen.
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The consortium's message is clear: they aim to capture the most profitable aspects of the stablecoin market.
