Visa, Mastercard and stablecoinsThis week, Visa partnered with a lesser-known but ambitious fintech startup, Bridge, to launch stablecoin-backed cards in six Latin American countries. The word "backed" is key here — we're talking about dollars, only digital. USDC, to be precise. And now a citizen from Peru can walk into a store for a watermelon, pay with a stablecoin, and the seller will receive pesos. And all this — through Visa.Hold on… Do you understand what this means?150 million merchants are now accepting digital dollars from citizens who have never had a regular bank account. This is not just fintech. This is — a reboot of the financial system.Inflation? No thank you, we're in the digital age.In countries like Argentina, where inflation exceeds 200% a year, the idea of saving in Argentine pesos looks like trying to hold water in a sieve. And here comes the alternative: stablecoins. Digital dollars, impervious to the whims of local central banks, which, to put it mildly, are not trusted by many.And this is no joke. In just 2022, the volume of stablecoin transactions worldwide amounted to $6.8 trillion — more than PayPal or Mastercard. And yes, Latin America is one of the most active regions.Mastercard did not stay aside. Of course.Competition is the engine of progress. So Mastercard, hearing Visa's footsteps, immediately pulled out its crypto trump cards: partnerships with Circle (the issuer of USDC), Paxos, and Nuvei. Their mission? To turn every smartphone and plastic card into a gateway for accepting stablecoins. It doesn’t matter where you are — in Brazil, Colombia, or on the beach in Tulum — now you can pay for purchases with a stablecoin that will instantly convert to the local currency. Magic? No, just crypto.While the US discusses CBDC, Latin America is already using the digital dollar.The irony is that while American politicians argue about whether they need a digital dollar, ordinary citizens in Latin America are already using it every day — through stablecoins. Just not from the government, but from the market. Paxos, Circle, Visa, Mastercard — these companies have already built the digital infrastructure without the involvement of officials and senators. As they say: fewer words — more transactions.So who will win? • Ordinary people — those whom traditional banks have ignored for decades. • Fintech companies — which can now bypass the old banking system. • Visa and Mastercard — which, instead of resisting, simply rode the wave.And who are the losers? Perhaps it’s the central banks, watching their money monopoly slip away into blockchain. And this is just the beginning.

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