According to Woofun AI, the settlement capability of stablecoins in the cryptographic native scenario is basically mature, but to actually enter offline merchant cashiers, they still face the challenge of a huge lack of “consumer layer”. The most viable path at this stage is to rely on payment card networks to achieve this leap forward.
When a user deposits 2000 USDC in the Base Chain wallet and walks into a restaurant, although this asset actually exists, the restaurant's cashier terminal is completely imperceptible. This sense of fragmentation reveals the fundamental difference between on-chain transfers and offline payments: the former requires only gas fees, block confirmation, and technical aspects such as dealing with chain restructuring, while the latter involves complex processes such as ISO 8583 standards, Apple Pay, or Google Pay. The merchant cashier system is based on strict communication message agreements, cashier software, cashier cooperation, and network rule manuals. When a user swipes a credit card or touches a mobile phone to pay, the system must return the authorization results within a very short period of time.
Cashiers don't need or want to understand gas fee fluctuations or chain restructuring risks; the vast majority of merchants don't even need to understand these concepts. Cardholders also don't want a payment experience full of the complexity of cryptocurrencies. The core value of Apple Pay and Google Pay is to encapsulate bank card vouchers as familiar, fast, and senseless payment methods. Settlement is back-end fund settlement, while consumption includes trust, transaction rules, authorization, messaging, and commercial security to ensure that merchants are willing to deliver products before funds are settled.
Over the past five years, stablecoins have become a reliable settlement infrastructure in various trading scenarios. In the fields of DeFi liquidity, corporate fund management, and cross-border remittance, stablecoins continue to carry large transaction volumes, operate 7 x 24 hours, complete settlement within seconds, and cost less than 1 cent for a single transfer. In cryptographic native and cross-border fund transfer scenarios, its settlement capabilities have almost taken shape.
However, paying a merchant is far more complicated than that. A cashier transaction requires payment documents, authorization engines, compliance checks, risk control and fraud prevention, chargeback rules, and foreign exchange, and is cleared through a card network. Transfers between wallet addresses do not require these steps at all, which causes industry narratives to often confuse settlement with consumption. The smart contract can transfer tokens from Alice to Bob in two seconds, but that doesn't mean cashier payments are easy. Settlement answers whether value has been successfully transferred, while consumption deals with whether the merchant can approve sales, deliver goods, handle fraud disputes, check turnover, and complete payment collection through existing systems.
Merchant acceptance is currently the biggest bottleneck. Although blockchain can transfer funds globally without permission, it cannot force merchants to accept cryptocurrencies. Merchants are willing to use Visa (V.US) and Mastercard (MA.US) because these card networks are deeply embedded in cashier hardware, e-commerce checkout software, billing cooperation, accounting processes, and user habits. When retailers evaluate payment methods, they consider the comprehensive cost of the entire business link; transaction fees are only one of them. The replacement of payment collection methods involves cashier equipment modifications, store training, end-of-day reconciliation scripts, tax software, and billing agency liability agreements, and has formed a strong path dependency. Direct stablecoin payments face three major challenges: retailers are unwilling to install additional independent QR code scanning devices next to existing terminals; finance teams want funds to be deposited into bank accounts via ACH or wire transfer on a fixed cycle; merchants rely on card organizations' chargeback mechanisms to deal with fraud and payment errors, and on-chain transfers are irrevocable once issued. This creates a contradiction: USDC in users' hands is liquid but cannot be directly spent offline. Instead of persuading tens of millions of merchants to transform software and hardware at once, it is better to let on-chain assets directly reuse the merchant's existing collection system.
Converting the token balance into a complete card payment requires eight major modules to collaborate, and the entire process must be completed in a very short period of time. The first is the wallet and asset balance. As a vehicle for users to store assets, it can be a self-hosted mobile wallet, browser plug-in, or licensed exchange account. The second is the stablecoin funding layer, which locks, reserves, or deducts tokens when payment authorization requests are received through APIs, protocols, or smart contracts. Third, the program infrastructure, or consumer layer, acts as the core engine to receive card authorization messages, check balances in real time, evaluate risk control strategies, and make risk decisions. The fourth is the payment processor, which processes ISO 8583 messages, PIN verification, and routes authorization information between card organizations and project management systems.
The fifth is card issuer and internet access. The licensed card issuing bank or main member institution provides the legal qualifications and card organization authority to issue payment certificates. The sixth is a card network, such as Mastercard (MA.US), which routes authorization and settlement messages between the card issuer and the recipient. The seventh is the billing agency and the merchant processor, which act as cooperative agencies on the merchant side to handle transactions, manage terminals, and settle cryptocurrency funds with merchants. Finally, there is the merchant's cashier, which includes a terminal, card reader, or online checkout page, where the user shows the proof of payment to complete the payment. This article focuses on the third layer, the consumer layer responsible for opening up wallet balances and payment network standards. Without this layer, on-chain dollars cannot access everyday business scenarios.
According to data compiled by Woofun AI, Immersve is a prime example of filling this gap. The company has built a B2B card infrastructure based on the ability of Mastercard (MA.US) to issue cards, so that wallets, exchanges, and fintech companies can use it to launch card certificates that are recharged from cryptographic asset balances without the need to independently establish a card issuance, authorization, compliance and settlement system. Self-developed card projects require membership in card organizations, connecting with card issuers and processors, establishing transaction monitoring, dispute processes, and multi-currency fund management capabilities. This is an extremely low input-output ratio for most teams.
Immersve operates a complete set of card projects in the back office. End users continue to operate in the original app, while wallets or fintech companies can launch their own branded cards and receive continuous transaction flow. Whether the track is hosted or self-hosted, this logic is in effect. MetaMask Card introduces the consumer layer into mainstream self-hosted wallets. Users operate within the wallet throughout the process, and the underlying infrastructure converts on-chain asset balances into card network transactions.
Escrow exchange platforms such as Binance, Bitget, and KuCoin also have the same requirements. Although user balances are stored in the platform ledger rather than in a self-hosted wallet, the core payment problem is the same: how to make this balance be recognized and spent by merchants connected to bank cards. Immersve isn't the only entrant; projects such as Rain, Baanx, Marqeta (MQ.US), Bridge, and Gnosis Pay are also solving similar problems, although they all have differences in hosting models, card issuance methods, project management, settlement, and distribution strategies. This indicates that an independent infrastructure market is being formed between on-chain asset balances and merchant collection systems.
The typical stablecoin bank card spending process is as follows: Users use a virtual card in Apple Pay or Google Pay to complete a touchless payment on a contactless terminal. The cashier terminal sends a standard card authorization request to the card network (such as Mastercard (MA.US)) through the recipient institution. Mastercard (MA.US) identifies the card BIN number and forwards the message to the project processor and consumer infrastructure. The platform verifies account status, runs risk control models and risk scores, and confirms that the associated wallet or account has sufficient stablecoin and foreign exchange buffer funds. After the transaction was approved, the authorization code was sent to the bank terminal via Mastercard (MA.US), and the user and clerk immediately saw that the payment was successful. The backend deducts, locks, or reserves users' stablecoin balances according to the project mechanism. During the regular clearing cycle, funds are disbursed and settled between the project, processor, card issuer, card organization, stablecoin service provider, and billing institution. The merchant saw a regular card transaction and received local currency settlement funds through the original payment channel. There was no need to touch digital assets, manage keys, or change the corporate accounting process throughout the process. The closer the front-end experience is to Apple Pay, the less users need to understand the source of funding behind it, and merchants still use the bank card payment system.
There is a significant difference in technical implementation between the hosted model and the self-hosted model. In the escrow model, an exchange or escrow wallet stores user balances in its own database. When an authorization request is received, the consumer infrastructure calls the platform API to verify funds. The platform generally locks or deducts the balance internally, and then the project settlement system assumes the corresponding financial obligations of the card organization. The self-hosting model is more difficult. Users hold their own private keys, and stablecoins are stored on the chain. During the cashier authorization window, it is impossible to wait for a new on-chain transaction to be confirmed because block time, network delays, and gas fluctuations cannot meet payment timeliness requirements. Therefore, the project must first approve the card transaction before the on-chain fund transfer is completed. This requires allocating smart contract authorization, fund reserves, delegated spending rights or liquidity arrangements in advance, and the project party first makes advance payments and then completes the on-chain settlement. The implementation solutions for different projects are different, but the same authorization layer supports both models, which ensures that cardholders can get a consistent payment experience no matter where the assets are located.
What may seem like a bland underlying ability is actually a real moat. Stablecoin payment promotions often emphasize transfer speed and low gas fees, but the real difficulties are hidden costs such as compliance, risk control, foreign exchange, and three sets of ledger reconciliations. Compliance and sanctions screening covers KYC, anti-money laundering, sanctions list control, transaction monitoring and wallet risk screening, and covers the entire process of account opening, continuous monitoring and transaction authorization. Fraud risk control requires real-time scoring of the risk of cardless transactions, abnormal offsite transactions, high-frequency transactions, and certificate theft. In terms of disputes and chargebacks, card networks allow consumers to cancel unauthorized transactions or unfulfilled orders, and consumers are required to reconcile irrevocable on-chain funds with a dispute system that supports rollback. Foreign exchange and fund management requires that US dollar stablecoins can be exchanged for euros and yen in real time when spent in Paris and Tokyo. The project must reserve a foreign exchange buffer for each authorization to manage price differences, liquidity, and slippage, otherwise it will bear losses.
In addition, it is also necessary to complete three sets of ledger reconciliations on a daily basis: on-chain records, processing transaction flow, and card organization settlement documents. The card issuer and project manager are responsible for the card organization and supervision of each card under the project, and do not reduce liability because the funds come from the chain. Card organization rules govern authorization, disputes, and project entry, and the rules continue to change. Completing three sets of ledger reconciliations every night is a really difficult job, and it is also the root cause of difficulties in the payment business.
Although stablecoins can quickly gain support from a wide range of merchants through card distribution channels, they still face many unsolved problems. Card network dependency means that projects must abide by card organization rules and face fee adjustments and policy changes at any time. Once the card organization restricts certain digital asset structures, service providers need to make quick adjustments. Regulatory uncertainty is reflected in varying policy trends in regulations relating to card issuance, stablecoin reserves, user disclosure, and cross-border transfers in different regions. User spending habits are unclear, and it is uncertain whether users will use stablecoins as daily spending accounts, or only for specific scenarios such as travel, transaction repayment, freelance remittance, or anti-inflation reserves.
In terms of technical risk, self-managed funds rely on smart contract security, network availability, and stable gas costs, and network congestion or contract flaws will interrupt payments. Direct competition comes from large merchants or billing institutions that may set up cardless stablecoin checkout systems in the future for large-scale B2B or e-commerce payments. Stablecoin consumption through bank cards has not eliminated the costs of the card system itself. Transaction transfer fees, card organization fees, processing fees, project operation costs, compliance costs, and dispute liability will all be retained. The underlying channel for pure on-chain stablecoin checkout is less expensive, but only if merchants are willing to take on the new system integration, reconciliation, refund logic, accounting certification, and operational risks.
For many merchants, lower channel unit prices do not mean lower overall costs. Once enterprises are forced to transform their business processes, the overall cost rises. Bank cards solved the problem of merchant acceptance, but they also inherited their rules and restrictions. The wallet controls the user portal, the merchant controls the cashier scenario, the card organization controls the ability to accept payments and brand trust, and the card issuer and project manager have license, BIN authority, and card organization cooperation resources. To achieve touch-to-touch payment on a mobile phone, the four parties must work together. It is unrealistic to expect merchants to abandon all existing terminals, receipt processes, and accounting systems to directly accept on-chain transfers. Stablecoins solve settlement problems, while the consumer process needs to deal with a series of problems such as authorization, compliance, merchant access, and cashier experience.
If stablecoins were to become popular as regular payment instruments, the winning architecture would not require all participants to make changes at once. Users hold US dollar tokens, and wallets provide an interactive interface. The card network retains the merchant's ability to accept payments, merchants continue to accept regular fiat payments, and the consumer layer is responsible for opening up the transition between these two systems. Settlement makes stablecoins useful, and consumption will determine whether stablecoins can enter everyday life.