Inside stablecoin firm BVNK’s journey to a $1.8B acquisition by Mastercard

But it wasn’t just Coinbase who muscled in, Rist said. Visa also took a shine to BVNK.

“All the usual suspects were involved, and Visa had an advantage because they were an investor. They made some money out of BVNK…and they actually had an observer position on the board,” Rist said.

In the end, however, Rist said Visa decided not to pursue a potential acquisition. “I think they are adopting a slightly different strategy when it comes to to stablecoins. Rather than owning an operator, they will partner with multiple operators and partner also with Stripe, etcetera,” he said.

CoinDesk recently broke the news that all four firms — Stripe, Visa, Mastercard and Coinbase — were involved in backing a new stablecoin platform, which has since gone live. This only underlines the fact that stablecoins continue to be an area of importance for TradFi institutions despite an ongoing bear market in the crypto industry more broadly.

Looking at specific use cases keeping BVNK busy, Rist pointed to various treasury functions that are streamlined by the use of stablecoins.

“One large payments company working with BVNK rolls its treasury every 24 hours, and now they're using stablecoins to roll it,” he said.