Open USD (OUSD), the stablecoin project backed by Mastercard, Visa, and Stripe, went live on Wednesday, September 30, 2026, across Ethereum, Solana, Base, and Tempo blockchains. According to reports from CoinDesk, the project targets payments, banking, settlement, and institutional trading in a stablecoin market worth more than $300 billion that remains dominated by Tether's USDT with about $143 billion in circulation and Circle's USDC with roughly $74 billion. The founding partners include Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe, and Visa, each receiving an equal initial equity stake in the company. As reported by crypto.news, the five founding partners have committed more than $1 billion in liquidity support, with each partner contributing through activities best suited to their business model - including holding OUSD on balance sheets, keeping tokens on blockchains, or supporting market-making operations.
Chainlink has been named an official data oracle for Open USD, providing critical infrastructure support as the stablecoin enters live distribution. According to Chainlink's September 30 announcement, the oracle network's technology can support various use cases including collateral, trading, lending, margin products, automated market maker pools and yield vaults. Aave Labs has proposed adding OUSD to Aave V3 on Ethereum and Aave V4 Core Hub, with the stablecoin available as a supply and borrow asset while collateral use remains disabled. The proposal lists oracle configuration as pending and final risk parameters will be included after recommendations are available and Chainlink feeds enter production. This technical integration positions Open USD for broader financial applications across decentralized finance and traditional banking infrastructure.
Open Standard provides four access routes for businesses to mint and burn OUSD one-to-one with U.S. dollars through four supported integration providers. Coinbase access was scheduled to begin October 1, while BVNK, Stripe, and the Visa Stablecoin Platform were available from launch. Bridge Building Inc., a Stripe-owned company, currently issues OUSD with reserves held at BlackRock, Lead Bank, and BNY, while monthly reserve attestations are expected through Bridge. Through Stripe and Bridge, businesses can access services covering payment orchestration, wallets, cards, foreign exchange and fiat on- and off-ramps. Mastercard provides access through BVNK, while Visa offers OUSD through its Stablecoin Platform, which is currently in beta and subject to eligibility, volume and geographic restrictions.
As reported by CoinDesk, Open Standard is taking a unique approach to stablecoin economics, with CEO Zach Abrams stating that the "overwhelming majority" of the company's equity will eventually be distributed to founders and partners based on their contributions to OUSD's growth. Unlike traditional stablecoin issuers, Open Standard won't provide founding partners with special revenue shares - instead, they'll earn rewards based on OUSD supply generation under the same framework as other partners. The company plans to distribute much of its equity over the next 4-5 years to founders and network partners based on their contributions to OUSD's growth, with partners earning equity based on a combination of OUSD supply and transaction activity. According to crypto.news, the company will share nearly all reserve revenue with companies that help increase adoption, while also offering fee-free minting and redemption among OUSD's features.
According to crypto.news, Open Standard's broader partner network has expanded from more than 140 companies to over 200 companies, with recent additions including UBS, Japan's SBI Holdings, and fintech Jeeves. The company's management structure differs from traditional consortium models, with Abrams rejecting the consortium label and emphasizing that the company is managed by its leadership rather than through committee decisions. The founding group currently consists of five companies, with Abrams expecting expansion to 10-12 companies and plans to establish a board of directors composed of founders. Securitize has joined the ecosystem as an Open Standard Network Partner and plans to support OUSD access through its tokenization infrastructure. The partner network includes more than 200 financial institutions, fintech companies, banks and global businesses, with founders and participating network partners earning equity based on OUSD supply and activity generated through their platforms.
