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How Solana Is Driving USDT and USDC Business Adoption

Stablecoins have moved from being just trading instruments to becoming serious tools for business payments. They combine the speed of blockchain with the stability of the U.S. dollar, making them perfect for e-commerce, payroll, remittances, and B2B settlements.

Two stablecoins dominate this space: USD Coin (USDC), known for transparency and regulation, and Tether (USDT), valued for liquidity and global reach.

The missing piece for many merchants has been infrastructure—a blockchain fast and cheap enough to make stablecoins competitive with cards, bank wires, or PayPal.

That’s where Solana enters the picture. Its high throughput and minimal fees make USDC and USDT transactions nearly instant and virtually costless. And with Speed now integrated with Solana rails alongside its Bitcoin Lightning Network, merchants can offer customers multiple high-performance payment options from a single platform.

Solana’s performance edge: The foundation for Stablecoin adoption

Solana was designed to solve the biggest pain points for blockchain-based payments, that is, speed, cost, and scalability.

  • The block time for Solana is ~400 milliseconds, which implies that payments got confirmed almost instantly.
  • Throughput is up to 65,000 TPS that is more than enough capacity for global retail-scale adoption.
  • The cost per transaction is less than $0.0025 per transaction compared to 2-3% fees or fluctuating gas costs.

For merchants this provides the ability to process thousands of small transactions profitably while offering real-time checkout experiences for customers. Businesses get the advantage to scale globally without any network congestion affecting their transaction reliability.

Unlike Ethereum, which can slow under heavy demands, Solana’s architecture which is Proof of History along with Proof of Stake ensures consistent performance even at peak usage.

Stablecoin landscape on Solana: USDC vs USDT

Solana has become one of the leading blockchains for stablecoin activity, with over $11 billion in circulating stablecoins.

Stablecoin Share on Solana Approx. Value in Circulation
USDC 70-73% ~$8 billion
USDT 27-30% ~$2-3 billion


USDC dominates in Solana due to compliance, audits, and institutional adoption. While USDT maintains a strong presence for its liquidity and global accessibility, especially in regions where USDC adoption is lower. 

On-chain growth metrics and real usage

From mid-2024 to June 2025, Solana’s stablecoin economy exploded:

  • +300% market cap growth
  • 50M+ daily transactions
  • $40B+ monthly transaction volume

These numbers are not only from DeFi traders but businesses are increasingly paying their suppliers from countries abroad, processing the customer and vendor refunds within seconds. Merchants are able to automate the subscription process without being involved in the middleman fees. This makes it a real world utility, not just a speculative activity.

Regulatory trust & business confidence: Why USDC leads

USDC, issued by Circle, is regulated and fully backed by audited reserves of cash and U.S. Treasuries.

Why this matters to merchants:

Reduced compliance risk
USDC and USDT on Solana are issued by regulated entities, which makes them more transparent and compliant compared to many other digital assets. For merchants in highly regulated sectors like iGaming, fintech, and e-commerce, this reduces the risk of chargebacks, fraud disputes, or regulatory penalties. In practice, this means smoother audits, easier cross-border settlements, and fewer operational headaches.

Greater customer trust
When customers see trusted stablecoins like USDT or USDC at checkout, they know they’re paying with assets backed by real-world value. This builds confidence, especially for global customers who may hesitate with volatile cryptocurrencies. By offering familiar and widely adopted stablecoins on Solana, merchants can create a frictionless and credible payment experience that encourages repeat purchases and brand loyalty.

Easier bank integration
Stablecoins on Solana simplify the conversion pipeline from crypto to fiat. This helps merchants who need to settle funds back into their bank accounts. With fast transactions finality and low fees, Solana makes USDT/USDC settlement seamless, enabling quicker liquidity management and reducing dependency on slow, costly banking intermediaries. Merchants can expand globally without being bottlenecked by outdated payment rails.

Speed Bitcoin & Stablecoin payments: Lightning meets Solana

Speed recently integrated Solana-based USDC and USDT transactions into its platform, which already supports Bitcoin via the Lightning Network.

Merchants now get:

  • Lightning-fast settlements in both BTC and stablecoins, ensuring funds arrive almost instantly. No more waiting days for bank clearance or dealing with settlement delays that tie up your working capital.
  • Ultra low transaction fees whether you’re processing micro-payments or handling large transaction volumes. This keeps more of your revenue in your business instead of losing it to payment processors.
  • Multi-asset flexibility by accepting BTC, USDC, USDT seamlessly through a single integration. This gives your customers the freedom to pay in their preferred currency, while you manage everything from one streamlined dashboard.

For a global e-commerce brand, SaaS provider, or even a digital marketplace, this translates into smoother cross-border payments, reduced overheads, and a checkout experience that matches modern customer expectations. By enabling crypto payments without the complexity, merchants are not only keeping up with demands but staying ahead of it.

Use cases: Real impact on businesses

The true value of Solana-based USDC and USDT payments lies in real-world adoption. Businesses across industries are already leveraging these payment rails to cut costs, speed up settlements, and expand their customer base.

  1. E-commerce: Online stores are using Solana stablecoin payments to bypass card networks, avoiding costly fees and eliminating the risk of chargebacks. This allows merchants to keep more revenue while offering customers a faster, more reliable checkout experience.
  2. Freelance platforms: Companies managing global contractors are paying instantly in USDT on Solana, eliminating long delays from bank transfers and giving freelancers access to funds within seconds.
  3. Manufacturing supply chains: Importers and exporters are setting invoices directly with suppliers using USDC payments on Solana, speeding up cross-border transactions that previously took days and reducing the reliance on costly SWIFT transfers.
  4. Digital services and SaaS: Subscription-based platforms are automating recurring billing with stablecoin payments, cutting down on transaction friction and ensuring predictability, low-cost revenue collection.

With Speed’s invoicing tools, real-time reporting, and built-in currency swaps, merchants gain full flexibility. A business can:

  • Receive payments in USDT
  • Instantly convert them to USDC or Bitcoin(BTC)
  • Withdraw to the supported wallet or reinvest into digital assets — all within minutes.

For businesses operating internationally, this means fewer intermediaries, faster payments, and improved treasury management, core advantages for scaling operations efficiently.

USDT’s role on Solana: Supporting liquidity and flexibility

While USDC leads in compliance and transparency, USDT on solana continues to play a vital role in ensuring liquidity and flexibility for businesses.

  • Global liquidity: USDT remains the most widely traded stablecoin across global exchanges, making it an essential tool for businesses that need instant conversion into other digital assets.
  • Emerging market usage: In many regions where banking systems are limited, USDT is the most commonly adopted stablecoin. For merchants expanding into emerging markets, offering USDT payments ensures access to customers who rely on it as their primary digital currency.
  • Trading and settlement flexibility: With nearly every major crypto asset paired against USDT, merchants that integrate it gain the widest reach for cross-border payments and asset conversion.

On Solana, USDT benefits from the same advantages as USDC like, sub-second transaction speed, negligible fees, and scalable infrastructure. This makes it indispensable for businesses seeking to balance regulatory trust (via USDC) with global liquidity reach (via USDT).

Emerging trends & future directions in Stablecoin payments

The stablecoin landscape on Solana is evolving rapidly, with new innovations expanding the possibilities for businesses:

  • PYUSD (PayPal USD): PayPal’s entry into Solana is bridging the gap between traditional fintech and blockchain payments, providing merchants with an additional stablecoin backed by a globally trusted brand.
  • Yield-bearing stablecoins: Products like USDY and USDS allow businesses to turn idle treasury funds into income-generating assets, offering new opportunities for treasury management and cash flow optimization.
  • CCTP (Cross-chain transfer protocol): This innovation from Circle is enabling USDC transfers across multiple blockchains without intermediaries, creating a seamless infrastructure for businesses that operate across multiple ecosystems.

For merchants, these trends point to a future where stablecoins are more than just a payment method. They become tools for liquidity management, cross-chain flexibility, and even revenue generation by reshaping how businesses think about money movement.

Impact of Speed’s Solana integration: Adoption & efficiency

The integration of Solana USDC and USDT payments into Speed’s ecosystem is already driving measurable business benefits:

  • Higher acceptance rates: By offering both Bitcoin and Solana stablecoin payments, merchants can accept a wider range of customers, regardless of their preferred currency.
  • Better cash flow: Instant settlements eliminate the waiting times of traditional rails, allowing businesses to access funds in seconds instead of days.
  • Lower operational costs: By replacing expensive credit card fees and banking intermediaries, businesses save significantly on transaction costs which is a saving that scales with volume.

Real-world example:

A cross- border SaaS platform using Speed reduced its settlement time from 3 days to 3 seconds by moving from conventional payments to USDC on Solana. At the same time, it cut fees by over 95%, directly improving margin and cash flow.

This level of efficiency doesn’t just save money — it gives businesses a competitive advantage in delivering better customer experiences while scaling globally.

Conclusion & business implications

The combination of Solana’s unmatched performance, USDC’s compliance and transparency, USDT’s liquidity, and Speed’s merchant-first payment infrastructure is creating a new standard for digital payments.

For B2B merchants, adopting USDC and USDT on Solana means faster transactions than traditional rails like SWIFT and ACH, lower processing costs compared to credit card and wire fees, borderless access to a global customer base without relying on intermediaries, and improved treasury flexibility with the ability to swap between BTC, USDT, and USDC instantly.

As stablecoin payments evolve, businesses that move early will gain a decisive edge—enjoying faster growth, higher customer satisfaction, and strong financial efficiency.

If your business wants instant settlements, lower fees, and global reach, now is the time to explore Speed’s Solana-powered payment solutions.

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Speed Team