In Standard Chartered’s October 14 analysis, Geoffrey Kendrick names the multi-bank network model among the challengers in developed-market transactions, where he says yield capture will decide the winners.
Standard Chartered, the London-headquartered international bank with a major footprint across Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, named A+ in its October 14 analysis of the stablecoin market, placing the multi-bank network model among the challengers in the sector its Global Head of Digital Assets Research, Geoffrey Kendrick, describes as the most contested going forward.
The Research in Brief
The analysis lays out the current landscape of stablecoins, noting an interesting juxtaposition underpinning the market: supply has stabilized while velocity has surged. Supply sits at roughly $309 billion in 2026, while monthly transfers averaged just under $10 trillion this year, up from $4 trillion in 2025, with a record $19 trillion in May. Velocity has roughly doubled to about 30 times supply, with USDC turning over near 80 times and USDT near 7 times. Growth, meanwhile, is taking longer than expected: Standard Chartered pushed its $2 trillion market forecast from 2028 to 2030. And the regulatory clock is ticking, with the GENIUS Act taking effect in January 2027.
What Kendrick Wrote
Kendrick’s argument is that the next phase of competition is not about scale alone. It is about who captures the economics of the reserves behind the coins, nowhere more than in developed-market transactions, where the traditional finance replacement race is now the most contested ground.
“It is the DM transactions/TradFi replacement sector which we see as the most contested going forward. I highlight a number of challengers that compete at the margin – USDG for venues, M^0 as longer-run infrastructure, and the multi-bank network model (A+) for banks outside the incumbents’ existing yield-share terms. Issues like yield capture will ultimately determine how this sector plays out.”
Built for the Next Phase
A+ is a multi-party issued stablecoin, $USDA+. Banks and regulated institutions join one unified network and issue a GENIUS Act-compliant stablecoin, rather than building a whitelabel coin with limited liquidity and brand recognition, and they keep 100% of the yield. A compliance layer modeled on BSA-style KYC and AML, with freezing, burning, and law-enforcement cooperation controlled by issuer consensus, is how A+ bridges decentralized and traditional finance.
That structure fits the next phase. As competition shifts from scale to yield capture, who keeps the income from reserves, the incumbents’ yield-share terms leave banks outside the economics. A+ is built so banks keep them, offering regulated institutions an easy plugin solution with the core functionality of Circle and Coinbase, without asking each bank to build its own coin. Kendrick names A+ as one of several challengers at the margin, alongside USDG for venues and M^0 as longer-run infrastructure, and the contest is still to be decided.
With the GENIUS Act taking effect in January 2027, that contest moves from analysis to market structure. A+ is building for it now.