(2/4) Holding dollars, moving dollars: the two economics inside one stablecoin market

By Darren Wang, Founder and CEO, Owlting Group (NASDAQ: OWLS)

A payment operator earns a fee each time money is converted, routed and delivered, so its revenue grows with the number and value of payments it completes. The figures it manages most closely are the price of each payment, the cost of the services behind it, and the volume that covers the fixed cost of compliance and operations.

Blockchain technology has made the transfer itself very low-cost. Drawing on Allium's September comparison, insights4vc notes that a transfer cost less than one cent on seven of the eight networks shown, with Ethereum the highest at 13.52 cents.[4] The value a business pays for comes from the work around the transfer: currency conversion, local payout, funding accounts in advance (prefunding), sanctions screening, resolving payments that need attention, and reconciliation, which matches every payment to the right record. The World Bank's remittance pricing methodology likewise counts the exchange rate and the speed of delivery as part of the total cost, alongside the stated fee.[7]

Careful measurement also matters. A Bank for International Settlements working paper found that nearly 60% of 593 million stablecoin transfer events on Ethereum in 2025 were steps inside larger, multi-step transactions, such as trading and lending.[8] Allium filters for this, and its payment figures are a modeled estimate based on wallet labels and transaction patterns.[1][4] For a payment operator, the figure that counts is completed customer payments, because that is where fees are earned.

With the transfer itself costing a fraction of a cent, customers pay for everything that gets a payment to its destination safely and on time. insights4vc reaches a similar view: in its analysis, infrastructure companies that take on compliance, liquidity and reconciliation work on their customers' behalf are well placed to earn durable fees.[4] From an operator's viewpoint, I would put it in concrete terms. A durable fee rests on the parts of a payment that take time to build: licenses where money is sent and received, banking relationships in destination markets, local payout, transaction monitoring, and a team that follows every payment through to delivery.

Regulation is also taking clearer shape. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), a U.S. federal banking regulator, issued its final rule implementing the GENIUS Act, the U.S. federal law for payment stablecoins, on October 21, 2026, effective January 18, 2027. The rule sets standards for stablecoin issuers, and the OCC said rules on anti-money laundering and sanctions will be addressed separately with the U.S. Treasury.[9]

For payment operators like Owlting, anti-money laundering, sanctions and money transmission requirements already apply under existing law, and meeting them is part of everyday operations. That is a big part of why the compliance layer of a payment takes years to build, and in our view it is the part of a payment whose value holds up best over time.

[1] According to Allium, "State of Stablecoins and Payments, Q3 2026," October 15, 2026. Please see: https://www.allium.so/reports/state-of-stablecoins-and-payments-q3-2026

[4] According to insights4vc, "The Economics of Stablecoins and Payments in 2026," October 22, 2026. Please see: https://insights4.vc/blog/The_Economics_of_Stablecoins_and_Payments_in_2026

[7] According to the World Bank, "Remittance Prices Worldwide: Methodology." Please see: https://remittanceprices.worldbank.org/methodology

[8] According to the Bank for International Settlements, "The anatomy of stablecoin transactions," BIS Working Paper No. 1359, June 11, 2026. Please see: https://www.bis.org/publications/working-paper-1359-anatomy-stablecoin-transactions

[9] According to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, "OCC Advances U.S. Digital Asset Leadership with Final Rule to Implement GENIUS Act," News Release 2026-92, October 21, 2026. Please see: https://www.occ.gov/news-issuances/news-releases/2026/nr-occ-2026-92.html

About Owlting Group

Owlting Group (NASDAQ: OWLS) is the operating brand of OBOOK Holdings Inc., a global fintech company building regulated payment infrastructure, founded in Taiwan with subsidiaries across the United States, Japan, Poland, Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Malaysia. Its OwlPay platform is a fiat-digital currency hybrid payment solution that helps businesses move money across borders in the expanding digital economy. Recognized for rapid growth and industry leadership, Owlting was ranked No. 226 on the Financial Times and Statista “High-Growth Companies Asia-Pacific 2026” list with a 42% compound annual revenue growth rate, and named among the key global players in a 2025 digital currency market report by CB Insights. For more information, visit www.owlting.com/portal/?lang=en.

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