Tiger Research says stablecoin growth is shifting from issuers like Tether and Circle to payments, on-ramps, and asset management layers where long-term revenue and control over user flow are emerging.
The stablecoin industry's economic center of gravity is migrating away from issuers like Tether and Circle toward the layers that distribute, spend, and manage the tokens after they are minted, according to a new report by Tiger Research.
The research firm breaks the stablecoin stack into five stages: issuance, on-ramp, remittance, payments, and management. Its core argument is that the market has focused too narrowly on issuers' balance sheets and regulatory risk. The real business leverage, Tiger Research says, is forming in the "flow" of stablecoins as they move through distribution, spending, and redeployment into yield-bearing strategies.
Issuance remains an oligopoly. Tiger Research estimates the stablecoin market at roughly $300 billion, with dollar-pegged assets accounting for 99.99% of supply. Tether and Circle together control about 83% of the market, a self-reinforcing loop of liquidity and trust that the report says leaves little room for new entrants pursuing a straightforward minting model.
Circle's partnership with Coinbase illustrates how issuance increasingly depends on downstream incentives. Institutions deposit dollars through Circle Mint, which issues USDC 1:1. Reserves go into cash and money market instruments, including a fund managed by BlackRock. The more telling detail, Tiger Research notes, is how that income is shared. External distribution revenue is reportedly split evenly between Circle and the liquidity channel. The issuer has engineered incentives for distribution, not just the token itself.
The on-ramp layer, converting fiat to stablecoins, is essential but brutally competitive. Tiger Research estimates the effective net take rate for on-ramp providers converges around 3%, squeezed by comparable products and limited differentiation. Consumer pricing varies by rail, with bank transfers cheaper than card purchases. As more providers replicate the same conversion function, the segment behaves increasingly like a commodity business.
MoonPay is cited as a representative example. The non-custodial platform facilitates fiat-to-crypto purchases, earning per-transaction fees and spreads. Tiger Research contends sustainable profitability will require moving beyond one-off conversion fees toward embedded B2B distribution, such as white-label integrations into major wallets and apps, or expanding into issuance and settlement functions with repeatable, contract-based revenue.
Remittances are where stablecoins' cost advantage is most visible. Traditional cross-border transfers often carry average costs above 6%, while the on-chain leg of stablecoin transfers can be close to negligible. Revenue rarely comes from the act of sending itself, Tiger Research emphasizes. It is captured at the endpoints through FX spreads, fiat conversion, and regulatory compliance.
That dynamic is giving rise to "compliance-as-infrastructure" models, where licensing and regulatory readiness become defensible moats. In the U.S., navigating state-by-state money transmitter licensing can be a barrier that incumbents monetize as part of an integrated cross-border stack.
The report highlights Rise as an example of how remittance-like products evolve into broader enterprise services. Rise enables companies to pay salaries in fiat or USDC and has processed more than $1.5 billion in cumulative volume. Its differentiation lies beyond payment rails. The platform packages KYC/AML checks, country-specific contract generation, tax documentation, and employer-of-record functions into a subscription-like service. Revenue streams can include monthly fees, volume-based charges, legal liability products, and even management of idle balances. Customer relationships, not transaction fees, define the business.
Stablecoin payments remain economically immature relative to traditional money, Tiger Research argues. On-chain retail stablecoin velocity is estimated at roughly one-twentieth of fiat M1, meaning repeat everyday usage has not been established at scale. Payments economics still mirror legacy card structures: interchange revenue is split across card networks, issuing banks, and payment processors. The more attractive opportunity, Tiger Research suggests, sits with issuance and settlement infrastructure providers rather than the visible consumer brand.
Rain is cited as an illustration. The company provides B2B infrastructure that allows wallets, crypto exchanges, and neobanks to issue branded cards running on Visa and Mastercard networks. Stablecoin balances are debited in real time and settled daily in USDC. Tiger Research argues this approach enables 24/7 settlement and can reduce collateral requirements by as much as 60% compared with traditional card models. The economic prize in payments is less about the headline card fee and more about issuer status and same-day settlement capabilities.
The report sees the most sophisticated business models forming in the management layer, where stablecoin balances are redeployed into yield strategies. Issuers face constraints on directly passing reserve yield to token holders. Management products can transform idle balances into user-facing returns, creating new fee pools for curators and platform operators.
Tiger Research notes a structural shift in decentralized lending from single-pool designs, where one asset failure can cascade through the system, toward modular architectures that isolate risk by market. This evolution is enabling on-chain asset management led by risk curators who set parameters, choose collateral, and allocate capital across markets in ways that resemble traditional delegated portfolio management.
Steakhouse Financial is highlighted as a leading example. Rather than building a protocol from scratch, Steakhouse operates atop existing lending infrastructure such as Morpho, selecting collateral assets, designing loan-to-value parameters, and directing capital across markets. The model generates revenue via management fees and performance fees. Tiger Research estimates the top four curators control roughly 65% of curated total value locked, suggesting early but rapidly consolidating market structure.
The report flags meaningful risks. Depegging events and contagion in restaking-related segments have shown that headline yields alone may not retain institutional capital. Tiger Research observes a shift away from higher-yield synthetic dollar products toward offerings backed by U.S. Treasuries, reflecting institutional preference for predictable outcomes over maximum returns.
The stablecoin industry is moving from competition over supply, who can issue more, to competition over distribution and lifecycle, who can own the customer flow. The report points to recent corporate moves that favor integration with legacy rails rather than wholesale replacement. Stripe's acquisition of Bridge and Mastercard's collaboration with BVNK signal that stablecoin adoption is increasingly being engineered as an efficiency layer within existing financial systems.
Tiger Research identifies several promising arenas: the spread of local-currency stablecoins, card issuance and settlement infrastructure, custody, and the on-chain management stack. As governments and financial institutions explore domestic stablecoin frameworks, the report argues they may favor proven issuance infrastructure and bank-connected corridors over entirely new systems. The winners of the next phase will be determined less by minting tokens and more by controlling the layers that move, settle, and manage them.
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