- Banking Circle launched fiat-to-stablecoin and stablecoin-to-fiat settlement, enabling banks to move funds seamlessly across traditional and blockchain rails with instant settlement and regulatory traceability.
- The move comes days after Banking Circle received its CASP license, which positions Banking Circle to embed stablecoin capabilities directly into a bank’s existing infrastructure.
- Stablecoins are quickly emerging as an always-on settlement layer that is becoming standard in cross-border payments.
European cross-border payments fintech Banking Circle is narrowing the gap between stablecoin and fiat today. The fintech is launching stablecoin settlement services, a suite of fiat-to-stablecoin and stablecoin-to-fiat capabilities that will facilitate the movement of funds, regardless of whether they sit on bank rails or blockchain rails.
The announcement comes days after Banking Circle received a Crypto-Asset Service Provider (CASP) license from the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF). The newly minted license will allow Banking Circle to expand from cross-border fiat services into digital asset services.
“The award of our CASP license is an important milestone for Banking Circle, as well as for the broader payments ecosystem,” said Banking Circle CEO Laust Bertelsen. “Stablecoins have fast evolved from a peripheral innovation into core infrastructure for cross-border settlement, treasury management, and financial inclusion.”
Banking Circle will integrate its new stablecoin settlement service into banks’ existing infrastructure to help them take advantage of stablecoin rails. The new tools will offer increased security, lower risk, and more convenience than traditional global settlement rails, creating efficiencies for banks.
After they integrate with Banking Circle’s core platform, clients will be able to interoperate between fiat currencies and leading stablecoins, including USDC, USDG, and EURI. Leveraging stablecoin rails, Banking Circle will offer instant settlement and full regulatory traceability.
“We have spent years building the financial infrastructure that enables more than 750 payment companies, financial institutions, and marketplaces to efficiently move and convert over €1.5 trillion annually across the globe,” said Banking Circle Chief Digital Asset Officer Kirit Bhatia. “Stablecoins are a natural extension of that infrastructure and central to our mission of eliminating unnecessary cost and complexity through technology.”
Founded in 2013, Banking Circle was acquired by private equity firm EQT in 2018 for $300 million. Headquartered in Luxembourg and regulated by the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF), the bank is fully licensed and serves as a correspondent bank offering multi-currency bank accounts and virtual IBANs as well as bank connections for local clearing and cross-border payments.
Banking Circle has branches in Denmark, Sweden, Germany, Norway, Poland, the Czech Republic and the UK, and subsidiaries in Liechtenstein, Singapore and Australia.
Banking Circle’s announcement shows that banks across the globe are rethinking the underlying infrastructure of payments. Stablecoins are emerging as an always-on settlement layer that can complement traditional correspondent banking networks. As banks across the globe integrate stablecoin payments rails into their platforms, and as the global stablecoin market reaches approximately $293 billion, it is becoming clear that stablecoin rails are slowly becoming a standard part of cross-border payments, rather than an alternative.
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