The Scoop
Users of payments app Zelle will soon be able to send money overseas, as the consortium of US banks behind the service expands internationally using stablecoins, its CEO said in an interview.
“There are ways to move money internationally and have been for years, but not as fast or seamless as some of these newer technologies,” Early Warning CEO Cameron Fowler said.
Fowler declined to give specifics on whether the group would issue a single stablecoin of its own — an idea Semafor is told is under discussion — or whether it would allow its members to issue their own. He said the company would make future announcements about its technology, as well as what foreign banks it would bring into its network, which includes 2,300 US institutions.
US regulators have become more hospitable to stablecoins and other digital assets under the Trump administration. The Genius Act passed earlier this year sets up framework to oversee stablecoins.
“The regulatory environment is much more clear and against that set of conditions, Zelle is able to innovate more quickly,” Fowler said.
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The biggest US banks came late to peer-to-peer payments, launching Zelle years after Venmo, owned by PayPal, had built a user base and a brand name that functions as a verb. They are determined not to make the same mistake in global payments, where fintech players like PayPal or Revolut, Europe’s most valuable unicorn, have an edge with users. Both legacy banks and startups have been trying to compete with firms like Moneygram or Western Union, which historically charged large remittance and currency-changing fees.
EWS’s scale — it is jointly owned by, and pushed through the apps of, Bank of America, JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, Capital One, US Bank, PNC, and Truist — is formidable, even against buzzy fintechs. Despite launching seven years after Venmo, Zelle handles twice as many payments a day as Venmo and five times as many as Block’s Cash App.