U.S. Bank completed a cross-border payment using its self-issued USBDC stablecoin on the public Stellar blockchain, executing the transaction between its North American and European entities.
The Minneapolis-based lender, with $445.4 billion in assets as of June 2026, integrated its Digital Asset Platform with Stellar's permissionless network. The platform supports minting, redemption, freezing and clawback capabilities—controls aligned with banking supervisor requirements for managing digital assets on public chains.
The USBDC is pegged to the U.S. dollar. The transfer remained integrated with U.S. Bank's existing internal systems while utilizing an open network.
Gunjan Kedia, chairman and chief executive officer at U.S. Bank, said the pilot "demonstrates our ability to accelerate global cash management and money movement capabilities." Jamie Walker, head of digital assets and money movement at U.S. Bank, added that the initiative aims at "delivering solutions that solve real client challenges while maintaining the safety, security, and reliability that clients expect from U.S. Bank."
Few large banks have issued stablecoins directly on permissionless public blockchains. Société Générale operates EURCV and USDCV via SG-FORGE; SoFi Bank issues SoFiUSD; Custodia Bank and Vantage Bank operate Avit. JPMorgan's JPMD trades on Coinbase's Base network but is categorized as a deposit token rather than a stablecoin.
The move reflects broader institutional exploration of blockchain for settlement. Earlier this week, Citi and DBS conducted tokenized USD transfers using the Swift blockchain network.
