The Year in Stablecoins 2025: Record Growth as GENIUS Act Opens the Floodgates

Stablecoins just had their biggest year ever.

The total stablecoin market capitalization grew 49% in 2025, from $205 billion in January to $306 billion at the end of November, according to data from crypto analytics platform DeFi Llama.

The ballooning of the stablecoin category has been driven by very strong catalysts. Over the past twelve months, stablecoin issuers have achieved a US regulatory framework, further clarity and rollout of MiCA in the European market, and its adoption by institutions.

Stablecoins are digital tokens designed to contain a 1:1 peg to fiat currencies such as the US dollar or the euro. Issuers hold fiat money in reserve with the promise that tokens can be exchanged for the underlying money at any time. Two of the oldest and most widely used stablecoins, Tether’s USDT and Circle’s USDC, have been around since 2014 and 2018 respectively.

But it wasn’t until July of this year that President Donald Trump signed the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for US Stablecoins Act, or GENIUS Act. It was introduced in May by Senator Bill Haggerty (R-TN), won Senate approval in June, and was signed into law a month later.

“The passage of the GENIUS Act was very important. That created a federal regulatory framework for stablecoins that we haven’t had yet. So I think it provides clarity for the market. Hopefully it will address at least some of the risks of stablecoins. So I think it’s a very important step forward,” Timothy Massad, former chairman of the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission, told me. Declutter.

Even before the GENIUS Act was signed, the industrialization of stablecoins was in full swing. Payment processor Stripe unveiled plans to support stablecoin rails in May, saying they would be supported in more than 100 countries. PayPal expanded support for PYUSD to Tron and Avalanche networks in September, just as the stablecoin reached the $1 billion mark in circulation.

And Circle, which previously tried to go public via a SPAC in 2022, finally made its debut with an IPO. When CRCL began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on June 30, it was so popular that the exchange stopped trading three times within the first hour, with the token’s price more than tripling in that short time.

But it hasn’t been smooth sailing for all stablecoin issuers. In November, S&P Global Ratings downgraded Tether’s USDT stability to ‘weak’, arguing that Bitcoin’s inclusion in its reserves makes it susceptible to higher risks if BTC’s price crashes.

Tether has faced concerns about the composition of reserves backing its stablecoin before, in 2021, as critics sounded the alarm about its commercial paper holdings. Commercial paper is a form of short-term, unsecured corporate debt. By the end of 2022, the issuer claimed it had completely eliminated commercial paper from its reserves.

At the same time, some of the largest stablecoin issuers have just received preliminary approval for national bank charter applications from the Office of the Comptroller of the currency.

Circle, Ripple, Paxos, BitGo and Fidelity – which is not a stablecoin issuer, although it tested one earlier this year – have all been provisionally approved for bank charters by the OCC.

“New entrants to the federal banking industry are good for consumers, the banking industry and the economy,” said Jonathan V. Gould, comptroller of the currency, in a news release. “They provide consumers with access to new products, services and credit sources and create a dynamic, competitive and diverse banking system.”

And there will be more regulations to accommodate stablecoin issuers. In December, Travis Hill, acting chairman of the FDIC, told lawmakers that the agency “has begun issuing rules to implement the GENIUS Act,” and expects to propose an application framework “later this month” and prudential standards “early next year.”