Banking and payments titan Fiserv is entering the stablecoin race with its own token designed for regulated rails.
Fiserv, a public payments giant with a market cap of over $90 billion, plans to launch its own USD-pegged stablecoin by year-end. Dubbed FIUSD, the stablecoin is aimed at financial institutions and part of Fiserv’s new digital asset platform integrated into its existing banking and payments systems.
In a Monday press release, the Wisconsin-based company said the stablecoin is designed to help its global network — includes approximately 10,000 financial institution clients and six million merchant locations — build new products and services “at no additional cost.”
“Together with our other cloud-native banking and merchant platforms, we believe FIUSD will provide our clients with the efficiency and optionality they need to thrive in the evolving banking and payments ecosystem,” said Takis Georgakopoulos, chief operating officer at Fiserv.
The stablecoin will run on the Solana (SOL) blockchain and use infrastructure from stablecoin issuers Paxos and Circle. The financial services giant said in the press release that FIUSD is expected to operate alongside other stablecoins and may also include deposit token options, which could be more appealing to banks.
The launch comes as Congress moves closer to setting clear rules for stablecoins in the United States. Last week, the Senate passed its stablecoin-focused bill, the GENIUS Act, with broad bipartisan support. Now, the House is weighing its own version, the STABLE Act, which is broadly similar, but gives more oversight to federal regulators.
According to Fiserv, FIUSD will include features like fraud checks and risk management, and will be easy to add to existing banking platforms.
Fiserv, which provides payment and financial technology services to banks and merchants worldwide, says this is just “the first in a series of announcements that Fiserv will be making with partners on its new digital asset platform.”
The company’s stock, which trades under the ticker FI, is up nearly 4% this morning eastern time, following the news.
Source: https://thedefiant.io/news/tradfi-and-fintech/payments-giant-fiserv-to-roll-out-bank-friendly-stablecoin-on-solana