What happened? Mastercard is reportedly close to buying Zerohash for about $1.5–$2 billion.
Mastercard is in late-stage talks to acquire Zerohash, a Chicago-based company that provides APIs and plumbing for stablecoin, crypto custody, conversions and payouts. Bringing Zerohash in-house would give Mastercard more direct control over fiat funding and on-chain settlement across its payments rails. The move, if confirmed, would be one of Mastercard’s biggest bets on stablecoins and comes as peers like Stripe and Coinbase make similar plays.
Who does this affect? Merchants, fintechs, banks, crypto infrastructure providers and stablecoin ecosystems.
Merchants and fintechs that already route payments through Mastercard could get faster, plug-and-play access to stablecoin and tokenization features without rebuilding their stacks. Banks and corporates testing tokenized deposits and on-chain treasury tools would gain a standardized bridge for compliance, custody and payouts. Competing infrastructure firms and startups face consolidation pressure as large payment companies snap up white‑label issuers and compliance tooling.
Why does this matter? It could speed mainstream stablecoin payments and reshape competition across the payments market.
If Mastercard folds Zerohash into its network, on-chain settlement and 24/7 programmable payouts could roll out faster, cutting cross-border costs and settlement times for businesses. The deal would heat up a race with Stripe and Coinbase to control enterprise-grade stablecoin rails, likely driving more consolidation and quicker product launches. For markets, that means more stablecoin volume moving into everyday payments, pressure on traditional processor margins, and heightened regulatory scrutiny as big firms centralize crypto settlement.