World cost orchestration platform Orbital launched its inaugural ‘Stablecoins Retail Funds Index’, offering an in depth view of how stablecoins are being utilized in shopper cost contexts. The Q2 2025 snapshot finds that Binance Sensible Chain (BSC) has turn out to be the main blockchain for retail-sized transaction volumes, now accounting for 45 per cent of such funds.
The index, developed in partnership with blockchain information supplier Artemis.xyz and cellular app information agency Sensor Tower, focuses on shopper funds valued as much as $10,000 to filter out large-scale B2B and institutional transfers. Based on the evaluation, the findings spotlight the distinct position stablecoins are carving out in retail funds, significantly for cross-border transactions the place velocity and value are essential elements.
Binance Sensible Chain leads in consumer-sized funds
The info reveals a notable shift in retail cost behaviour, with lower-cost networks like BSC and TRON driving important stablecoin adoption. BSC’s rise to the highest place for consumer-sized funds, at 45 per cent of the quantity, underscores this development. The index additionally recognized Aptos as a “chain to look at” attributable to its notable progress on this section.
USDT leads retail funds however USDC sees quicker progress
Whereas USDC is the dominant token within the decentralised finance (DeFi) house, the index exhibits this isn’t the case for retail funds. On this class, USDT stays the dominant power, with transaction volumes greater than 4 occasions that of USDC. Nonetheless, the report additionally notes that in latest months, USDC has skilled quicker progress than USDT in retail-sized cost volumes, suggesting a possible shift in consumer desire.
The index additionally identifies a possible challenger in USD1, which noticed a 757 per cent enhance in retail transaction quantity between Could and June. The token accounted for about six per cent of all wallet-to-wallet transfers in June, with time zone evaluation suggesting its utilization is concentrated exterior of the Americas.
Stablecoin premiums reveal shadow FX charges
A key discovering from the index is the numerous variation in the price of buying stablecoins in several markets, which the report suggests is an indicator of “shadow FX” charges that differ from official authorities charges.
In Venezuela, for instance, retail customers are usually paying a forty five per cent premium over the official market charge to buy USDT. Different nations with notable stablecoin premiums embody Turkey, South Africa, and Saudi Arabia, highlighting the position of stablecoins in markets with forex controls or excessive inflation.
Luke Wingfield Digby, co-founder and head of company improvement at Orbital, commented on the launch of the index: “Stablecoins have shortly turn out to be a giant a part of our financial system, a handy and quick method to transfer cash round, with over $250bn in circulation in the present day. What’s much less clear is how and the place stablecoins are used for on a regular basis retail-sized transactions. Questions are sometimes requested on whether or not stablecoins might be a part of folks’s on a regular basis expertise of cash, changing or complementing the funds we make in the present day. The reply to that query could also be a way away, however Orbital’s Stablecoins Retail Funds Index provides us perception into in the present day’s developments and the place this market could also be heading.”
