Payroll and contractor platform Deel launched its own dollar-backed stablecoin, DLUSD, on June 3, letting remote workers get paid in U.S. dollars without needing a bank account. The token went live first in Argentina, where the peso lost between 20% and 40% of its dollar value over the past year. Separately, Mastercard announced on June 2 that it will start settling payments using stablecoins across eight blockchain networks, including Ethereum, Solana, and Base.
Why Argentina first
Deel said 85% of its Argentine contractors in 2025 wanted dollar pay over pesos. That demand, plus the country's currency volatility, made it the obvious launch market. The company plans to roll out DLUSD to Latin America, Asia-Pacific, MENA, and Africa in the coming weeks.
The tech stack behind DLUSD
Deel built DLUSD using Stripe's crypto infrastructure — a first for an enterprise combining all three pieces. Stripe's Bridge handles stablecoin issuance, Privy manages wallets, and the Tempo blockchain processes settlement. Contractors see a simple dollar balance in a digital wallet and never touch the blockchain layer. The goal: make stablecoin pay feel as normal as Venmo.
Mastercard opens up settlement
Mastercard's move means banks and fintechs can settle transactions using USDC, RLUSD, PYUSD, USDG, USDP, and SoFiUSD on any of eight networks. That includes Ethereum, Solana, Base, and XRPL. The new rails allow intraday, weekend, and holiday settlement — a big deal for cross-border payments that usually wait for bank business hours.
The stablecoin numbers behind the push
Stablecoins handled an estimated $46 trillion in transaction volume last year — more than 20 times PayPal's volume and nearly three times Visa's, per industry data cited by both firms. Global stablecoin market cap hit $317 billion as of April 2026, up more than 50% year over year. Analysts expect stablecoins to make up 3% of all U.S. dollar payments in 2026 and 10% by 2031.
Deel and Mastercard aren't the only ones moving. The stripe of their moves — launching a proprietary stablecoin and enabling settlement on-chain — reflects a broader shift. The question now is which other payroll giants follow Deel's lead and how fast Mastercard's stablecoin rails get adopted by major banks.
