preferred on
Points of Focus
- Coinbase and Citi launched two live stablecoin payment products for businesses on Sept. 28.
- The launch expands a partnership Citi and Coinbase first announced in October 2025.
- Citi chose to partner with Coinbase rather than build or issue its own stablecoin.
Coinbase and Citi announced on Sept. 28 that they have launched two live products connecting fiat payments and stablecoins for businesses: Coinbase Virtual Accounts, powered by Citi’s Virtual Account Wallet, and stablecoin acceptance through Spring by Citi.
We're bringing stablecoins into the banking system with @Citi.
That means instant stablecoin acceptance for institutions – all on bank-grade, regulated infrastructure.
The next step for stablecoins becoming everyday money. pic.twitter.com/9ftQ50yl5y
— Coinbase 🛡️ (@coinbase) September 28, 2026
The announcement turns a partnership the two companies first revealed in October 2025 into infrastructure businesses can use now rather than a project still being explored.
Coinbase Virtual Accounts and Spring by Citi target business payments
Coinbase Virtual Accounts give businesses bank-account-like functionality to accept, hold, and pay funds, with incoming fiat automatically converted to stablecoins and Citi acting as the bank of record.
Stablecoin acceptance through Spring by Citi lets merchants accept stablecoin payments at checkout with automatic conversion back to fiat for settlement, aimed at enterprise merchants and Citi’s institutional clients rather than individual consumers.
Alec Lovett, head of infrastructure product at Coinbase, said the aim is that “our shared customers can move between fiat and digital assets without ever having to think about which one they’re touching.”
The rollout covers the US first, with “additional capabilities to follow in the coming months,” per the announcement, leaving the international timeline unspecified.
Citi and Coinbase expand a partnership first announced in October 2025
This launch is not a first-time deal. Citi and Coinbase first announced a partnership on Oct. 27, 2025, aimed at the same underlying problem: fiat on- and off-ramps that don’t run 24/7 the way crypto trading does.
That earlier announcement centered on improving deposits and withdrawals and exploring settlement capabilities, without naming specific products.
Brett Tejpaul, head of Coinbase Institutional, described the new launch as giving “Coinbase customers bank-grade fiat infrastructure on one side and Citi’s institutional clients easy, low-friction stablecoin acceptance on the other, without either side needing to build or manage a system they don’t need.”
Citi bets on Coinbase’s rails instead of building its own stablecoin
The move places Citi on a different path than some competitors.
JPMorgan built its institutional payments rail, Kinexys, in-house rather than routing through an outside stablecoin platform, while Mastercard has run stablecoin settlement work with partners such as SoFi.
Citi’s approach instead wires its regulated banking infrastructure into Coinbase’s existing rails rather than issuing a stablecoin or building comparable infrastructure internally.
Debopama Sen, head of payments and services at Citi, said the companies are building payments infrastructure “that is seamless, interoperable, and operates across both traditional and digital payments instruments and networks.”
A US-only launch leaves Coinbase’s 150 million stablecoin holder claim untested
Coinbase’s announcement cites a market of “more than 150 million stablecoin holders worldwide” as the opportunity these products address, a figure sourced to Coinbase’s own materials rather than an independently verified third-party estimate.
With the launch confined to the US and international capabilities left at “coming months” rather than a specific date, how much of that global figure this partnership actually reaches depends on a rollout timeline neither company has committed to in writing yet.
Share
Most read articles
