stablecoin is my safe word

Hi,

It’s Deana Newsletter here. Tune in to our livestream right now to learn about lithium-ion fires and burning Waymos from the Senior Tech Reporter at Scientific American, Deni Ellis Béchard.

We’re also going to talk wallets with Bryce Ferguson, the founder of Turnkey, and touch on Apple update thots, selfies with Tim Cook and more.

Bye!

The Boys

Writer: Deana

Editor: Miranda

Everything is Stablecoin. We were all skeptical, but Circle stuck the landing on the IPO of the year (so far.)

On June 5, Circle’s IPO was priced at $31 and closed day one at $83. Its high so far was roughly $125, hitting ~4× in under a week. What this signals, besides everyone getting very very rich without me, is that TradFi’s full body embrace of crypto stablecoins is just getting going.

We just learned that Stripe is acquiring wallet infrastructure company Privy. In his announcement post, Stripe co-founder Patrick Collison specifically mentions stablecoins. Stripe, still privately held, is reportedly valued at $91B.

Other recent stablecoin hits include a big French bank saying oui to a USD-pegged “USDCV,” making it the first global bank to mint a US Dollar stablecoin. Also, PayPal is dangling a 3.7% yield on PYUSD to lure in retail, but tbh they need to jack that up if they really want to be in the arena.

Stablecoin float has swelled past $250B worldwide, enough to move government treasury markets. The GENIUS Act is working its way through Washington, though watch out for regulatory capture. Regulators in Asia are pushing licensing regimes in places like Hong Kong and South Korea.

This seems like a smart idea that I’m sure 50 different teams are building rn.

All that said, in 2025 the safest way to say “crypto” is still “dollars on the blockchain.”

From Bankless to bankmaxxing.

Quick Hits.

• Vitalik reply guys to Aella, gets ratioed.

• Andrew Tate’s shitty crypto trades exposed.

• A Facebook Marketplace lowball strategy for the ages.

• Condolences to Kalshi as X announces prediction market partnership with Polymarket. (And by extension, congrats to friends at Polygon!)