Highnote, Cross River Bank, and Visa Launch Stablecoin Settlement for Enterprise Payments

This week, Highnote announced a new stablecoin settlement capability in partnership with Cross River Bank, supported by Visa. The news marks an important milestone in how stablecoins are moving into real-world payment environments, with USDC settlement now operating within enterprise payment flows.

But the announcement itself is only the starting point.

What truly matters is what this moment represents: a clear sign that stablecoins are entering a new phase of maturity, and that settlement, long one of the most rigid layers of the payments stack, is finally evolving.

Stablecoins Are Growing Up

For years, stablecoins have been discussed primarily as a concept. Promising faster movement of value, round-the-clock availability, and improved capital efficiency, they captured the imagination of developers and innovators, but often lived outside the systems that power everyday commerce.

That is changing quickly.

Stablecoins are now being integrated into regulated, production-grade payment environments, supported by trusted financial institutions and global payment networks. Visa’s stablecoin settlement pilot marks a shift from experimentation to application, bringing onchain settlement directly into the systems where businesses already issue cards, accept payments, and manage funds at scale.

"Stablecoin settlement matters when it delivers practical advantages in real payment settings that benefit customers," said John MacIlwaine, CEO of Highnote. "The future of payment operations is faster, simpler, and always on."

At Highnote, we see this evolution as inevitable and foundational.

Why Settlement Innovation Matters

Settlement is one of the least visible, yet most consequential, parts of the payments ecosystem. While consumer experiences have improved dramatically over the last decade, settlement has largely remained constrained by batch processing, fixed windows, and delayed access to funds.

“Offering this capability at Highnote moves us toward that reality by enabling continuous value movement and more efficient reconciliation", said MacIlwaine. “Our unified platform supports this evolution across issuing, acquiring, and money movement, strengthened by the reach of Cross River and Visa.”

Stablecoin settlement opens the door to something fundamentally different: faster funds movement, seven-day settlement availability, and improved capital efficiency for card programs, all without any change to the consumer card experience. Cards still work the same way. What changes is everything behind the scenes.

What This Means for the Highnote Platform

Highnote was built to unify issuing, acquiring, credit, and real-time money movement on a single platform. That unified architecture is what makes stablecoin settlement not just possible, but powerful.

By integrating stablecoin settlement into the Highnote platform, we are extending the capabilities available to our subscribers across the entire payment lifecycle. This creates opportunities to reduce settlement friction, improve reconciliation accuracy, and unlock new efficiencies that are difficult or impossible to achieve with fragmented systems.

Stablecoins are not a standalone feature. They are an accelerant for the kind of always-on, intelligent payment operations modern businesses expect.

A Competitive Advantage for Our Subscribers

For Highnote subscribers, this capability represents more than faster settlement. It represents optionality and differentiation.

Enterprises and platforms can design payment programs with greater control over timing, liquidity, and capital flow, without changing the consumer-facing card experience. They gain access to settlement innovation without having to stitch together separate providers or rebuild infrastructure, while operating within trusted banking and network frameworks.

As payments become more embedded into software, marketplaces, and vertical platforms, these advantages matter. Speed, flexibility, and control increasingly define who wins.

Trust, Partnerships, and the Path Forward

Innovation at this level requires more than technology. It requires regulated infrastructure, strong partnerships, and a shared commitment to bringing new capabilities into production responsibly.

“For stablecoins to realize their full potential, they must operate within unified systems,” said Luca Cosentino, Head of Crypto at Cross River. “Our participation in Visa’s stablecoin settlement pilot and collaboration with Highnote demonstrate how onchain settlement can be implemented effectively in real-world payment environments.”

Our work with Cross River Bank and Visa reflects a shared belief that the future of payments must combine modern technology with institutional-grade reliability. Together, we are showing how stablecoin settlement can move from concept to commerce.

The Bigger Picture

Stablecoin settlement is becoming part of mainstream financial infrastructure. Platforms that can operationalize it responsibly will define the next generation of embedded finance.

As the only unified platform that brings issuing, acquiring, credit, ledgering, and real-time money movement together, Highnote is uniquely positioned to lead the next phase of embedded finance.

Interested in learning more? Let’s talk.