Bank of Italy Study: Stablecoin Remittances Beat Global Average but Lose to Wise in 4 of 7 Corridors

The Bank of Italy ran 200 real USDC transfers across 10 payment corridors connecting Italy with Brazil, Argentina, Japan, the UAE and South Africa. The goal was to compare total costs and settlement times against conventional remittance services. The results undercut the standard crypto pitch: blockchain fees were negligible, but exchange fees and currency conversion – the fiat on-ramps and off-ramps every stablecoin transfer still depends on – drove the real expense.

Costs ranged from 0.3% to nearly 9% across the 10 corridors, the researchers said. The 0.3% end looked competitive on paper. The 9% end was worse than most wire transfers. Where a corridor landed on that spectrum depended heavily on local payment infrastructure and regulation, the study found. Transfers settled in under 20 minutes where instant payment rails existed. Where they did not, settlement took one to two business days – no faster than a standard bank transfer.

The World Bank pegs the global average remittance cost at 6.65%. Stablecoin transfers beat that number in most corridors. But the more telling comparison is against Wise, the fintech platform that already squeezed margins hard. Stablecoins only outperformed Wise in three of seven comparable corridors. In four corridors, Wise won, the researchers said. That result suggests the “cheaper and faster” narrative needs serious qualification, especially when the benchmark is a tech-forward competitor, not a legacy bank charging 8%.

The study did not frame the results as a condemnation. The researchers pointed to domestic instant payment infrastructure as a key variable. Invest in better payment rails locally, and stablecoin remittances become more competitive fast. The blockchain layer is not the bottleneck. The local financial plumbing is.

Regulatory design also made or broke a corridor’s efficiency. Prohibitionist regulations do not kill demand for stablecoins, the researchers said – they push users toward offshore platforms, which bring their own fees and less consumer protection. Restrictive frameworks that stop short of outright bans still complicate retail operations enough to erode whatever cost advantage stablecoins might otherwise offer.