In the path of stablecoins entering the real world, why are crypto cards still important?

In discussions about stablecoins, a common judgment is that as the use of stablecoins in transfers and settlements expands, the importance of traditional payment tools will gradually decline.

However, in a recent report titled "Stablecoin Payments at Scale: How Cards Bridge Digital Assets and Global Commerce" released by Artemis, a more pragmatic observation is made regarding the actual usage structure of stablecoins: stablecoins have been widely adopted at the asset storage and value transfer levels, but their implementation in real-world consumption still heavily relies on existing payment networks.

Data shows that the crypto card market has surged from the fringes at the beginning of 2023 to a massive annualized figure of $18 billion, with monthly transaction volumes increasing 15 times in just two years.

This means that stablecoins have solved the problem of how to move funds efficiently, but there still needs to be a viable connection for how these funds are accepted in the real world. Under current industry conditions, crypto cards are one of the most mature and scalable vehicles for this connection.

1. Why Crypto Cards, Not Native Crypto Payments

On the surface, stablecoins already possess all the technical conditions to serve as a payment method—on-chain settlement, programmability, and high efficiency. However, in the real world, payments are not just a technical act; they also involve:

• Merchant-side acquiring and clearing systems

• Compliance, liability, and risk control boundaries

• Compatibility with existing acquiring and clearing systems

This is why, in Artemis's breakdown of stablecoin usage scenarios, a structural characteristic can be clearly seen: the large-scale use of stablecoins is primarily concentrated at the transfer and settlement level, rather than directly at the consumer level facing merchants.

This structural distribution does not mean that stablecoins cannot be used for consumption; rather, it reflects that for stablecoins to enter real-world consumption scenarios, they must rely on mature, compliant, and scalable crypto payment infrastructure as a prerequisite.

At the same time, the market is actively seeking feasible paths to bring stablecoins into real-world consumption scenarios. Crypto cards, with their scalability and flexibility, have become an effective way to connect traditional and digital payment systems. They can carry payment paths for digital assets like stablecoins while also supporting fiat currency consumption and settlement capabilities. The market acceptance is also reflected in the data, with the transaction volume of crypto cards growing from about $100 million per month at the beginning of 2023 to over $1.5 billion by the end of 2025.

2. The Real Role of Crypto Cards: Embedded in Existing Payment Systems

As a bridge connecting crypto assets and fiat currency, the operational principle of crypto cards can be understood using a "sandwich structure":

• The upper and lower layers are still the fiat currency system and existing payment networks.

• Stablecoins are positioned in the middle, taking on the role of value transfer and clearing.

• Users and merchants do not necessarily perceive the existence of stablecoins directly.

In this structure, the consumption end requires an interface that can be widely accepted in the real world, and crypto cards are the key component fulfilling this role. In the aforementioned structure, crypto cards are not a substitute for stablecoins but rather an interface layer design:

• Internally, they connect stablecoin liquidity pools with corporate accounts.

• Externally, they connect to established payment networks like Visa and Mastercard.

• The middle layer is constrained by compliance, risk control, and clearing systems.

This allows stablecoins to be used for real-world consumption and expenditure without changing the merchant's payment methods or requiring users to understand on-chain details. From this perspective, the value of crypto cards lies not in whether the payment experience is sufficiently native, but in how closely it aligns with the operational logic of real-world payment systems.

3. In Corporate Scenarios, the Demand for Crypto Cards is Clearer

Before being widely used in consumer scenarios, stablecoins are more readily accepted in corporate settlement scenarios due to their efficient settlement and low friction characteristics. For example, using stablecoins to pay for overseas advertising, cloud services, and software subscriptions; completing settlement expenditures to global suppliers or partners; managing expenses across teams and regions, etc. A common example is a SaaS company that accepts subscription fees in stablecoins but still needs to use traditional payment tools to pay for Google Ads and AWS fees.

These scenarios are highly standardized and heavily reliant on existing payment networks. Under these conditions, crypto cards become a practical choice: they provide a compliant, low-friction, and scalable expenditure outlet for companies using stablecoins.

However, in practical implementation, crypto cards are not an isolated tool; they also need to connect with the company's funding and financial systems.

Taking Interlace's practice as an example, its crypto card product, Infinity Card, more accurately assumes the role of the expenditure layer within the corporate funding system. By directly connecting the company's multi-currency accounts and asset balances, it completes the conversion and clearing of crypto assets and fiat currency in the background, allowing corporate funds to be seamlessly used for global consumption scenarios without changing the original account structure and settlement logic.

Structurally, these enterprise-oriented crypto cards have several clear advantages:

• The card is directly linked to the corporate account, reducing operational costs from repeated recharges, manual transfers, and multi-layered clearing.

• It simultaneously supports fiat and crypto assets as sources of expenditure, with the system automatically completing exchanges and processing during consumption.

• A multi-user, multi-permission expenditure management mechanism designed around internal corporate usage scenarios supports quota control, role differentiation, and unified management.

Another noteworthy change is that more and more companies are not satisfied with using a single card but wish to integrate the capabilities of crypto cards into their own products or platforms as part of the user experience and business processes. This has also driven the gradual formation of Card as a Service (CaaS) in the crypto card field. Under the CaaS model, companies can:

• Issue virtual or physical cards through APIs, embedding card issuance capabilities into their own systems.

• Define their own usage scenarios, limits, and transaction rules for the cards.

• Treat crypto cards as part of their own business rather than a separate third-party product.

In Interlace's system, the crypto card CaaS capability is abstracted as a foundational module, including card issuance, compliance risk control, clearing, and settlement, allowing companies to build card products that meet their business needs on this basis. This change essentially reflects a trend: crypto cards are transitioning from user-facing tools to system-facing capabilities, which is what we often refer to as infrastructure.

Conclusion

From Artemis's report, we gain an important insight: the scale growth of stablecoins does not automatically mean they have entered every corner of the real world.

For the foreseeable future, crypto cards will remain one of the most mature and scalable connection methods between stablecoins and real-world consumption networks. Their value lies not in whether the narrative is sufficiently native, but in how closely they align with the operational logic of the real world, and this is precisely where payment infrastructure truly plays its role.