Stablecoins seen as ‘the default’ for payments as OKX brings crypto card to Europe

With EU banks exploring stablecoin issuance and regulators laying crushed rules, OKX says its paper marks a turning constituent successful crypto’s integration into mundane finance.

Updated Jan 28, 2026, 9:25 a.m. Published Jan 28, 2026, 8:10 a.m.

Stablecoins are moving beyond crypto experimentation and into trusted fiscal infrastructure, OKX said, arsenic it announced the motorboat of a caller debit paper successful Europe.

“Momentum is gathering fast,” Erald Ghoos, CEO of OKX Europe, told CoinDesk. “Regulators are putting existent guardrails successful place, large banks are not lone taking them earnestly for payments and settlements but are participating successful industry-wide EU initiatives to go issuers, and mundane users are choosing faster, cheaper integer payments.”

European regulators person accelerated that momentum done the rollout of the EU’s Markets successful Crypto Assets (MiCA) framework, which brings stablecoin issuers and crypto work providers nether a single, bloc-wide regulatory regime.

Ghoos’s comments accompanied OKX’s announcement that it has rolled retired a caller crypto payments paper successful Europe, allowing users to walk stablecoins straight astatine Mastercard-accepting merchants.

The OKX Card connects self-custody wallets with real-world payments, offering fee-free spending, though determination is simply a 0.4% marketplace dispersed applied astatine the constituent of conversion, and crypto rewards.

Unlike astir crypto cards that necessitate manual conversions oregon preloading funds, the OKX Card lets users wage with stablecoins held successful their wallets. The assets are converted lone astatine the clip of purchase. Users gain crypto rewards of up to 20% during a constricted promotional period.

The paper supports tap-to-pay functionality done mobile wallets similar Apple Pay and Google Pay and tin beryllium utilized astatine implicit 150 cardinal locations globally. Designed to integrate with OKX’s onchain infrastructure, it avoids centralized custody and emphasizes idiosyncratic control. “We’re making it elemental for anyone successful Europe to usage crypto for real-world purchases—instantly, securely, and transparently,” Ghoos concluded.

OKX issues the paper done a licensed European payments supplier and operates successful compliance with anti-money laundering (AML) and know-your-customer (KYC) regulations. Mastercard enforcement Christian Rau called the enlargement portion of an effort to bring stablecoins “into the fiscal mainstream.”

Ghoos said helium believes stablecoins volition soon beryllium wide adopted. “Initial adopters whitethorn beryllium crypto-natives, but implicit time, we judge instant, low-cost planetary payments via stablecoins volition go the default for everyone."

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