Payments giant Stripe said in its annual letter on Tuesday that it may be the “winter of cryptocurrencies,” but as the popularity of the digital dollar grows, it will be the “summer of stablecoins.”
The letter stated that Bridge, a stablecoin orchestration platform acquired by Stripe in 2024, more than quadrupled its transaction volume last year.
The company also said it would “soon” launch the Tempo mainnet, a payments-focused blockchain it developed with cryptocurrency firm Paradigm and began testing in December.
Stripe is increasingly focusing on bringing crypto to its payments network, viewing stablecoins as an alternative for cross-border transfers and programmable payments. Stablecoins are a $300 billion class of cryptocurrencies that are pegged to fiat currencies such as the U.S. dollar and use blockchain for faster and cheaper settlements.
Their utility causes stablecoins to become decoupled from cryptocurrency market cycles, the payments company wrote. Citing a recent report from McKinsey and Artemis, the report said that while Bitcoin is down 50% from its October peak and is down 6% in 2025, stablecoin payment volume has doubled to about $400 billion, with about 60% coming from business-to-business transactions.
“As the real world continues to evolve rapidly, stablecoin payments are advancing quietly and inexorably,” the company wrote in the letter.
Meta (META), the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp, plans to launch its own stablecoin with external partners later this year, CoinDesk reported on Tuesday, underscoring the growing demand for stablecoins.
Stripe said businesses processed $1.9 trillion in transactions on its platform last year, a 34% increase from 2024. The company also announced a tender offer valued at $159 billion.
Read More: Stripe’s Stablecoin Company Bridge Receives Preliminary Approval for National Bank Trust Charter