Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City report: 49% of stablecoins are used for trading liquidity, and less than 1% are used for payment applications

Gate News message. On April 13, the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City (Kansas City Federal Reserve) released its latest analysis report stating that, within the current financial ecosystem, stablecoins mainly serve cryptocurrency trading and liquidity management, and have not yet achieved large-scale payment applications. The report shows that about 49% of stablecoin supply is used for trading liquidity support across centralized exchanges, decentralized finance protocols, and crypto infrastructure; 29% is used for transfers between wallets or internal fund operations; 21% is idle; and the proportion actually used for real-world payments is less than 1%. The report’s analysis believes that, as a crypto-native tool, stablecoins are limited by cross-chain interoperability and their ability to connect with traditional financial systems, which has prevented them from breaking into payment use cases. Despite 2026 announcements from payment processors such as Mastercard and Visa indicating support for related technology, stablecoin payment applications remain in an early stage. The report notes that future development needs to address key issues such as interoperability, compliance frameworks, and identity verification.