2025: A New Chapter in Stablecoin Cross-Border Payments – The Wave of Fee Transparency is Coming

Image Source: pexels

2025 marks the year of transformation in the stablecoin payment field, with handling fees transparency becoming the core topic. Stablecoins are evolving into new financial infrastructure for the digital era, with total market cap exceeding $300 billion. Technological progress, market competition, and regulatory clarity jointly drive this change. The ultimate goal is to break traditional payment barriers and achieve efficient, low-cost global value transfer. McKinsey reports show stablecoin annual transaction volume exceeding $27 trillion. Enterprises show particularly strong interest in using stablecoins for cross-border supplier payments, indicating robust market demand.

This “silent revolution” is reshaping the global financial landscape through instant, transparent solutions, making stablecoin cross-border payments an unavoidable new choice for enterprises and individuals.

Core Highlights

• In 2025, stablecoin payments will become more transparent, with clearer handling fees.
• Stablecoin payments are much cheaper than traditional bank transfers, saving significant costs.
• Blockchain technology makes stablecoin transactions faster and more transparent, reducing intermediate links.
• Global regulators are establishing rules to drive the stablecoin market toward compliance and transparency.
• Individuals and enterprises should understand stablecoin payments to seize more efficient, low-cost global payment opportunities.

Transparency: The Inevitable Trend in Stablecoin Payments

Image Source: pexels

Fee transparency is not accidental but the inevitable result of the combined forces of technology, market, and regulation. For stablecoin cross-border payments, moving from opacity to transparency is the necessary path from the fringes to the mainstream. Behind this trend are the inherent flaws of traditional financial systems and the digital era’s fundamental demand for efficiency and fairness.

Hidden Costs in Traditional Payments

The traditional cross-border payment system has long been plagued by high and opaque fees. Users, whether individuals or enterprises, often cannot know the final cost of a remittance. These hidden costs are usually concealed in exchange rate markups, intermediary bank fees, and lengthy processing times.

The World Bank’s report reveals the severity of this issue. Data shows the global average cost for remitting $200 is up to 6.2%. For enterprises, the situation is even more severe.

• High transaction costs: For B2B wire transfers over $1,000, total costs may reach 3-5% or more of the transaction value.
• Concealed exchange rate markups: McKinsey research finds FX markups account for 40% to 60% of total international business payment costs. For example, in Europe, SMEs lose massively due to markups, with French SMEs alone losing over €650 million annually.
• Severe business disruptions: A Deloitte survey shows 78% of cross-border trade SMEs experience bank payment delays, with nearly half (46%) reporting business interruptions.
• Lack of payment visibility: Finextra reports 61% of cross-border traders see “lack of payment visibility” as the top issue dealing with traditional banks.

These hidden costs and inefficiencies form an invisible barrier, severely hindering global trade fluidity, especially for thin-margin SMEs.

Blockchain’s Technological Empowerment

Blockchain technology fundamentally provides solutions for fee transparency. Its core features bypass the complex intermediary networks of traditional finance, making value transfer direct and clear.

First, blockchain’s peer-to-peer (P2P) architecture eliminates intermediaries. In a decentralized network, transactions are verified and recorded by numerous nodes worldwide, not relying on a single central bank or clearing house. This means funds can go directly from payer to receiver’s digital wallet, drastically cutting fees previously charged by layers of intermediaries.

Second, on-chain transaction traceability is the technical cornerstone for fee transparency.

On-chain transactions are pseudonymous, not fully anonymous. While users’ real identities are not directly linked to wallet addresses, all transactions are permanently recorded on a public, tamper-proof ledger.

Anyone can view transaction details via a blockchain explorer, including sender address, receiver address, amount, and network fee (Gas Fee). This unprecedented transparency ensures all fees are clearly verifiable and cannot be hidden or altered, providing reliable basis for audits and oversight.

Intensifying Market Competition

As the stablecoin market matures, fierce competition forces all participants toward transparency. Whether emerging fintechs or traditional payment giants, they recognize low costs and clear fee structures as key to attracting users.

On one hand, emerging payment platforms challenge the status quo with “transparency” as their banner.

These new players erode traditional players’ market share by offering clearer fee details and more competitive prices.

On the other hand, traditional finance giants are not standing by. PayPal launched its own USD stablecoin PYUSD, directly participating in digital asset issuance and circulation. Visa is more aggressive, integrating USDC and others into its vast network, expanding support for Solana, Avalanche, and multiple blockchains, and piloting stablecoin settlements. Visa aims to provide more efficient cross-border settlement solutions for enterprises, reducing funds-in-transit time. Such layouts from industry giants undoubtedly accelerate the industry’s alignment with transparent, efficient standards.

Global Regulatory Push

Regulatory clarity is the strongest external force driving fee transparency. Past ambiguous environments allowed wild growth but limited mainstream adoption. Now, global regulators shift from observation to rule-making, with “transparency” a core requirement in all frameworks.

A landmark case is Thailand. Thailand’s SEC has approved USDT and USDC for trading on regulated exchanges, effective March 16, 2025. This aligns with global trends and offers more choices for investors. Tether’s CEO stated the company is committed to providing Thai users “safe, transparent, and reliable stablecoin experiences”. When a country legalizes stablecoins as payment channels, service providers must comply with local financial laws, clearly disclosing all fees and terms.

Globally, Europe’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) sends clear signals. MiCA’s key provisions include transparency requirements for crypto-asset service providers, mandating clear disclosure of pricing and fees. This top-down regulatory pressure forces the industry toward compliance and transparency, ending the era of arbitrarily charging hidden fees.

Forms of Transparency in Stablecoin Cross-Border Payments

Image Source: unsplash

As technology and markets mature, fee transparency is no longer abstract but manifests in specific product forms and service models. Future stablecoin payment platforms will compete not just on lower rates but on clearer, more understandable fee structures. This marks the industry’s shift from price wars to value wars.

“All-Inclusive” vs. “Itemized Bill” Models

In fee presentation, the market shifts from vague “all-inclusive” to clear “itemized bill” models.

• “All-Inclusive Price” Model: Similar to traditional wire services, platforms provide a total fee or hide costs in spreads. Users know only the total paid and received but cannot see specific intermediate charges, like platform service fee, network fee, and fiat conversion fee breakdowns. This model is simple but sacrifices transparency.
• “Itemized Bill” Model: The core of the transparency wave. Platforms list every fee like a shopping receipt. Users see complete cost breakdowns before initiating transactions. For example, modern platforms like Biyapay may include:
  • Platform Service Fee: Charged for processing, usually a fixed percentage of the amount.
  • Network Fee (Gas Fee): Paid to blockchain validators for processing, publicly transparent.
  • Fiat Deposit/Withdrawal Fees: Charged by banks or payment channels when buying stablecoins with fiat (deposit) or converting to fiat (withdrawal). For example, transfers via licensed Hong Kong banks cost less than credit card payments.

A typical example is Tether’s own conversion service. When users convert USDT to USD via its official platform, Tether charges about 0.1% fee. This clear pricing sets a benchmark for the “itemized bill” model.

Real-Time Quotes and Rate Locking

Another key transparency aspect is real-time and deterministic quoting. Traditional FX services often include hidden markups, with rates changing during processing, leading to final amounts differing from expectations.

Stablecoin platforms solve this pain point technically, offering “what you see is what you get”:

1. Real-Time Quote: Platforms connect directly to global crypto markets, providing real-time stablecoin-fiat exchange rates. Users input send/receive amounts; the system immediately shows the exact counterpart amount, no hidden spreads.
2. Rate Lock: Many platforms offer short-term rate locking. For example, after confirmation, the platform guarantees the rate for minutes. This provides valuable certainty for users, especially enterprises with large transactions, effectively avoiding market volatility risks.

This model combines stablecoins’ core advantage: 24/7 instant settlement. Traditional banks take 1-5 business days for cross-border remittances, while stablecoin transactions confirm in minutes, greatly enhancing fund turnover efficiency.

From Low Rates to Near-Zero Costs

Transparency ultimately reveals a stunning fact: on efficient blockchains, value transfer costs can be very low. This makes low-cost or near-zero-cost stablecoin cross-border payments possible.

Cost reduction mainly stems from underlying blockchain choices. Ethereum mainnet Gas fees were once high, but with Layer 2 scaling and new high-performance chains, transaction costs have plummeted.

As shown, sending stablecoins on Solana or Polygon usually costs under $0.1. As of March 2025, a simple stablecoin transfer on Solana averages about $0.025. Even complex token swaps cost $0.001 to $0.01.

When these ultra-low network costs combine with reasonable platform fees (e.g., 0.1% - 1%), total costs are far below traditional wires’ 3%-5%. For freelancers with frequent small payments or SMEs paying global suppliers, this cost advantage is revolutionary.

Challenges and Opportunities in the Transparency Wave

Despite fee transparency bringing huge progress, the stablecoin payment ecosystem’s maturation path is not smooth. This change brings new challenges while creating unprecedented opportunities for participants. Enterprises and users must understand these complexities to remain undefeated in the new landscape.

Regulatory Compliance Costs and Challenges

Regulatory clarity is a double-edged sword. It brings legitimacy but significantly increases operational costs and compliance difficulty. Major economies like the EU and US are building strict frameworks.

Issuers must meet stringent conditions for licenses. For example, regulators require issuers to hold 1:1 high-quality liquid assets as reserves. For foreign issuers aiming global operations, challenges are greater. They typically need sufficient reserves in US institutions for US user redemptions and register locally under US regulator oversight. These measures protect consumers and financial stability but form high entry barriers.

User Education and Gas Fee Understanding

For ordinary users, understanding blockchain native costs is a major challenge. Many new users mistakenly think transaction fees are fixed. In reality, Gas fees are network usage fees that fluctuate in real time based on congestion.

Gas fee volatility is determined by market supply and demand. When network volume is high, fees rise.

To address this, platforms simplify user experience technically. Account Abstraction allows platforms to pay Gas fees for users or let users pay with stablecoins without holding native tokens (like ETH). This makes transactions feel like traditional seamless payments.

Coexistence with Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC)

Stablecoins are not the only players in digital currency. Nation-issued Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC) are important competitors and complements.

• Stablecoins (Private Issuance): Issued by private entities, natively on public blockchains, with innovation and efficiency as core advantages, especially for Web3 and DeFi scenarios.
• CBDC (National Issuance): Direct liabilities of central banks, considered “digital cash.” They carry national credit, providing new monetary policy tools and fulfilling public payment functions.

Both will occupy different niches in future payment landscapes. Stablecoin cross-border payment flexibility makes them more attractive in commercial applications, while CBDC may become infrastructure for inter-nation settlements.

Balancing Security and Privacy

Finally, platforms must find a delicate balance between security, privacy, and transparency. On one hand, smart contract vulnerabilities and custody risks remain a Damocles sword. Attackers may exploit code flaws to steal funds, eroding user trust.

On the other hand, blockchain’s public transparency inherently conflicts with user privacy needs. To resolve this, the industry explores zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) and other privacy-enhancing technologies. These allow users to prove transaction validity without revealing details, meeting regulatory audit requirements while protecting commercial and personal privacy.

Embracing the New Chapter: Seize Transparency Dividends

The fee transparency wave brings tangible benefits to different user groups. Individuals, freelancers, and SMEs can now use stablecoins to escape traditional finance constraints, enjoying more efficient, low-cost global payment experiences. Seizing this dividend means mastering future value flow initiative.

New Remittance Choices for Individual Users

For individual users, stablecoin cross-border payments’ most direct advantage is drastic cost reduction. Traditional services include high transfer fees and hidden FX fees. Stablecoins bypass these, making cost structures clear.

When comparing different options, many individuals are not keen on managing on-chain wallets and Gas fees themselves. Instead, they prefer regulated platforms that bundle stablecoin payments with fiat on/off-ramps. For example, multi-asset wallets like Biyapay allow users to receive stablecoins, convert them into local currencies, and withdraw to bank accounts through a single interface, reducing the friction of switching between multiple apps.

BiyaPay positions itself as an integrated tool for cross-border payments, investment, and treasury management, supporting flexible conversion between multiple fiat currencies and digital assets. Before sending funds, users can rely on its free FX rate converter to estimate costs, and then initiate transfers via the cross-border remittance service. The app presents an itemized view of platform service fees, network fees, and fiat deposit/withdrawal charges, which aligns with the fee transparency principles discussed in this article and makes each transaction easier to audit.

From a risk and compliance perspective, BiyaPay operates under relevant licenses in multiple jurisdictions, including a US MSB registration and New Zealand FSP authorization, and uses these regulatory frameworks to support its stablecoin-based payment flows. For users who value lower costs but still expect a familiar, app-like experience, such platforms offer a pragmatic way to access the efficiency of stablecoins without taking on the full complexity of on-chain operations.

Cost comparison for remitting $1,000 vividly shows stablecoins’ disruptive edge.

Now, platforms like Stables and MoneyGram launch user-friendly mobile apps, enabling ordinary people to easily remit with stablecoins. Users can send stablecoins to over 150 countries via platforms like Biyapay, with recipients receiving local currency.

Global Payment Solutions for Freelancers

Freelancers often face global payment challenges, including high platform fees, long settlement cycles, and lack of banking in some regions. Stablecoins provide ideal solutions.

• Bypass high platform cuts: Platforms like Acctual and Mural allow clients to pay in fiat while freelancers receive USDC directly. This avoids traditional platform high fees.
• Instant arrival: Stablecoin transactions confirm in minutes, no days of waiting.
• Flexible conversion: Freelancers receive stablecoins and easily convert to local currency via Binance P2P markets or dedicated withdrawal services, depositing to bank accounts.

This model not only reduces costs but provides emerging market freelancers valuable access to global finance.

Stablecoin Cross-Border Payment Strategies for SMEs

SMEs in international trade benefit immensely. Stablecoin payments optimize supply chain settlements, enhancing fund turnover. A typical B2B payment scenario:

1. A Philippine SME procures materials from a Singapore supplier, agreeing on USDC settlement.
2. The buyer transfers USDC directly from its digital wallet to the supplier via platforms like Biyapay.
3. The transaction confirms on-chain in minutes, verifiable by both parties.
4. The supplier converts received USDC to local currency via compliant channels.

This process eliminates traditional wire delays and high fees, achieving near-real-time global fund settlements, injecting strong momentum into SMEs’ globalization.

2025 is a pivotal turning point for stablecoin cross-border payment fee transparency. This is not just technological evolution but the market maturing on a $200 billion cap, returning to user value. Despite challenges like CBDC competition and regulatory costs, a fairer, more efficient global payment era is accelerating.

Individuals and enterprises should stay attentive, actively understand and adapt to this change to seize future opportunities.

FAQ

What is a stablecoin?

A stablecoin is a special digital currency. Its value is usually pegged 1:1 to fiat currencies like the USD to maintain price stability. Users can quickly transfer value globally while effectively avoiding volatile price swings of other cryptocurrencies.

Is using stablecoins for payments safe?

Safety depends on two key factors: the issuer and the payment platform.

First, the stablecoin issuer needs sufficient reserves to back its value. Second, the chosen payment platform must have strong security technology and compliance qualifications. Choosing reputable platforms is the prerequisite for fund security.

Why are stablecoin cross-border payment fees lower?

Stablecoin payments use blockchain technology, bypassing multiple intermediaries in traditional banking. Transactions occur almost directly between payer and receiver, drastically reducing costs from layered transfers, significantly lowering overall fees.

Do I need to pay Gas fees myself?

Gas fees are blockchain network usage fees that fluctuate. However, many modern payment platforms simplify this via technologies (like account abstraction). Users typically don’t need to hold native tokens (like ETH) to pay Gas; platforms handle it automatically.