Author: TSE Staff

Key takeaways: Interlace, a stablecoin card issuing and payments infrastructure company, has made its first appearance in Latin America, attending Blockchain.Rio in Brazil as it explores expansion into the region. The company disclosed its Brazil debut in a post on LinkedIn. “This is our first market in Latin America and the first time the team has been on the ground in Brazil,” Interlace said, describing two days of conversations with exchanges, wallets, fintechs and platforms exploring card issuing in the country. Guilherme Santos, Interlace’s country manager for Brazil, said the visit marked a significant step for the company’s presence in…

Africa doesn’t have a stablecoin problem. It has a stablecoin opportunity, and investors have finally noticed. Between fragile local currencies, expensive cross border payments, and a diaspora that moves tens of billions of dollars home every year, dollar pegged tokens have quietly become one of the most useful pieces of financial plumbing on the continent. Regulators are still catching up. Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa and Ethiopia have all rolled out new rules this year, some welcoming, some openly hostile, but the money hasn’t waited around for clarity. In the first five months of 2026 alone, stablecoin infrastructure startups accounted…

Key takeaways: Polygon, a blockchain scaling platform focused on stablecoin payments, says foreign exchange volume linked to its network in Latin America has surpassed $3 billion, a milestone the company points to as evidence of growing on-chain payment activity across the region. The figure was disclosed in a Polygon market update, which the company said reflects stablecoins increasingly driving cross-border transactions and commerce on its network. Polygon Chief Executive Officer, Sandeep Nailwal, also pointed to strong stablecoin flows on the network and a recent top single-day chain revenue ranking, excluding Ethereum, as further signs of rising network activity. A network…

Key takeaways: Crypto payment cards are moving beyond their early niche, with monthly spending surpassing $750 million as stablecoins become an increasingly popular way to fund everyday purchases. Monthly crypto card volume reached $759 million in July, according to onchain data highlighted by a16z crypto and tracked by Paymentscan. That represents a roughly 2.5-fold increase from $306 million a year earlier, and a dramatic rise from less than $1 million when tracking began in October 2023. The cards allow users to spend crypto wherever conventional card networks are accepted, with stablecoins typically converted into local currency at the point of…

Key takeaways: Bybit has filed a civil complaint in U.S. federal court alleging North Korea stole roughly $1.5 billion in cryptocurrency and moved the funds into wallets and accounts controlled by state-linked cyber actors, obtaining a court order to freeze the assets while the case proceeds. The exchange identified a set of wallet addresses and custodial accounts in its filing that it says trace back to the same actors, describing a pattern of transactions consistent with past laundering techniques tied to North Korean cyber groups. Bybit said it used blockchain analysis and transaction tracing to follow the flow of funds…

In April, two crypto entrepreneurs were snatched off a street in Buenos Aires. Their captors held them for hours before letting them go. Investigators later found that both suspects flew out of Argentina within hours of the attack, one to the United Arab Emirates and the other to Turkey. A judge has since ordered their international arrest. In São Paulo state a similar plot played out differently. The wife of a crypto holder was taken and held for four days while her captors argued over the ransom. Police tracked her to a building in the city and rescued her before…

Key takeaways: Brazil’s central bank has ordered virtual asset service providers to hold certain crypto transfers for up to 24 hours starting January 1, 2027, adding a new anti-fraud layer to the country’s expanding digital asset rulebook. Banco Central do Brasil published Resolution BCB No. 584 on August 7, covering transfers above $10,000 destined for foreign crypto providers or self-custody wallets. The threshold applies either to a single transaction or a customer’s combined transactions within the same day. Smaller transfers can also face additional review when a provider’s risk policies flag reasons for closer scrutiny. The central bank said the…

Businesses across the continent are turning stablecoins into everyday financial tools, not trading chips For years, stablecoins in Africa were mostly seen as a way for crypto traders to park money between bets. That picture is changing fast. Payment companies, big card networks and even regulators are starting to treat stablecoins as something closer to plumbing. They move money. They settle trades. They help businesses survive currency swings that would otherwise eat into their profits. The continent is becoming “the world’s toughest test lab for stablecoins” as the technology gets pushed into real payment infrastructure. The problem stablecoins are solving…

Nairobi has fired the opening shot in what may become Africa’s defining financial policy battle of the decade. With the publication of its Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASP) regulations, Kenya has staked out a clear position: digital dollars will not flow freely through its economy without the central bank’s blessing. Under the new framework, which completes the implementation of the Virtual Asset Service Providers Act, 2025, the Central Bank of Kenya becomes the gatekeeper of the country’s digital currency economy. Its powers are sweeping. The regulator can instruct licensed intermediaries to limit access to foreign-issued stablecoins, the USDTs and USDCs…

Key takeaways: Nigeria accounts for about 60% of all stablecoin inflows into sub-Saharan Africa since 2019, according to International Monetary Fund findings cited by self-custodial crypto wallet Bitget Wallet. The IMF report attributed Nigeria’s dominance largely to households and small businesses using stablecoins for payments and savings rather than speculative trading. The fund separately estimated that Nigeria received approximately $59 billion in crypto asset inflows between July 2023 and June 2024, underscoring the scale of digital asset activity flowing through the country. Currency pressure is driving the surge Bitget Wallet said Nigeria’s stablecoin adoption has been driven largely by macroeconomic…