Open Standard, a novel stablecoin issuer supported by Coinbase, Mastercard, Stripe, and Visa, has introduced its USD-pegged token utilizing a framework created to allocate a greater share of the economics and governance to the entities that distribute and utilize it, instead of centralizing benefits with a sole issuing entity.
Open USD (OUSD), which was initially revealed in June, officially launched on Wednesday across Ethereum, Solana, Coinbase’s Base, and the Stripe-supported Tempo blockchains, as stated by Open Standard CEO Zach Abrams in an interview with CoinDesk.
Abrams previously co-founded and directed the stablecoin infrastructure enterprise Bridge, which was acquired by Stripe for $1.1 billion back in 2024.
“We want to be the most useful stablecoin, the same way the U.S. dollar is useful,” Abrams remarked. “Every other stablecoin is building a fund. We’re building money.”
Open USD enters a stablecoin sector valued at over $300 billion that continues to be dominated by two primary assets: Tether’s USDT, holding roughly $143 billion in circulation, and Circle’s USDC, possessing approximately $74 billion.
As commercial banks, payments institutions, and financial technology firms rush into this market, competition increasingly extends past simply introducing another digital greenback into areas such as distribution, liquidity, and the platforms where end users actively transact.
This dynamic creates an entry point that Abrams aims to capture. He noted that Open Standard’s currency is tailored for banking operations, international remittances, payment card settlement, institutional trading, and lending markets, all underpinned by an economic model structured to compensate entities that expand circulation and engagement.
“When are stablecoins successful? It’s when they recede into the background and just become a core part of your mom’s bank account,” Abrams explained.
From 140 partners to five founders
Open Standard initially stepped into the spotlight in June boasting over 140 partners across the payments, banking, blockchain, and tech sectors, counting entities like BlackRock, BNY, and Standard Chartered among them.
That initial announcement caused friction for rival Circle as the broader marketplace grew concerned that major USDC collaborators, such as Coinbase, Visa, and Mastercard, were throwing their weight behind a rival digital dollar.
Nevertheless, certain financial analysts questioned what those corporate alliances meant in practice and whether a consortium-style framework involving numerous companies—some of which are direct competitors—could govern decisions efficiently.
Abrams explicitly dismisses the label of a consortium.
He clarified that Open Standard has corporate investors, but the executive team manages the operations rather than routing decisions through a committee comprising hundreds of members. A much tighter circle of founding partners holds ownership and steering responsibilities, whereas the wider network is incentivized through compensation tied directly to their contributions toward OUSD adoption.
Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe, and Visa have invested as the first five founding entities, each securing an identical initial equity stake. Combined, they have committed upwards of $1 billion to build out OUSD liquidity pools over the ensuing months.
“Each of these folks [is] going to lean in and hold OUSD on their balance sheet, or hold OUSD onchain, or help market-make, or, in whatever use case makes the most sense for them,” Abrams stated.
The exact financial contribution and equity percentage for each firm were not made public.
Abrams mentioned that these five corporations are currently Open Standard’s exclusive investors, though he anticipates the founding contingent will eventually expand to encompass roughly 10 to 12 enterprises. Furthermore, Open Standard intends to constitute a board of directors comprising these foundational members.
Meanwhile, the partner ecosystem committed to adopting OUSD has climbed past 200 businesses, Abrams added, with Japan’s SBI Holdings, Swiss financial institution UBS, and fintech provider Jeeves representing the newest additions.
Equity for usage
Open Standard also adopts an alternative strategy regarding how stablecoin revenues and economics are divided.
Typical stablecoin issuers accumulate interest yield from the cash deposits and securities backing their digital tokens. Tether retains the vast majority of that yield, while Circle shares a fraction of its USDC reserve income with distribution allies like Coinbase.
Open Standard seeks to make this collaborative relationship fundamental to its operational design.
Abrams noted that founding partners will not receive preferential revenue payouts. Instead, they will acquire rewards based strictly on the volume of OUSD circulation they produce, operating under the exact same parameters as any other partner.
Abrams indicated that a substantial portion of Open Standard’s equity is likewise earmarked for distribution over the next four to five years to founders and network participants relative to their contributions toward expanding OUSD.
“The overwhelming majority of our cap table is going to be distributed back to founders and non-founders based on how they help grow the network,” Abrams asserted.
Token supply won’t serve as the sole metric. Participants reaching a defined baseline can earn equity driven by a combination of OUSD issuance and transaction volume, offering a compelling incentive to circulate the token rather than merely hold it. The enterprise refrained from disclosing the exact threshold required for participants to unlock these benefits.
This model arrives as multiple financial institutions experiment with collectively backed stablecoins. For instance, Qivalis enjoys the backing of 37 European lending institutions working on a euro stablecoin, whereas 21 financial heavyweights, including Bank of America, Citi, Goldman Sachs, and UBS, intend to establish an enterprise issuing stablecoins tailored for settlement and digital asset transfers.
From Abrams’ perspective, the commercial opportunity stretches far beyond capturing market share from USDT or USDC. He emphasized payment card clearing, foreign exchange, and cross-border transactions as domains where stablecoins can transfer capital with greater speed and frequency than legacy banking architecture.
Open USD will additionally discard minting and redemption fees, which could yield significant cost savings for entities shifting substantial sums into and out of stablecoins, according to Dan Romero, chief business officer at Tempo, during a media discussion.
Romero expressed confidence in reaching approximately $1 billion of OUSD volume on Tempo over the upcoming months, scaling past $10 billion throughout 2027 and potentially surpassing $100 billion across subsequent years. Open Standard intends to deploy OUSD across multiple blockchain networks, but Tempo aims to compete aggressively to serve as its deepest liquidity hub, he explained.
Additionally, U.S. dollars might merely represent the initial phase.
Abrams noted that Open Standard already observes robust demand for stablecoins denominated in alternative currencies. Significantly, Bridge—the firm he co-founded and ran until recently—previously issued a euro-pegged asset for Revolut, highlighting clear corporate demand for currencies extending beyond the greenback.
“It’s purely going to be driven by demands from the network, and I can tell you the network already demands other stablecoins,” he stated.
Looking out an entire decade, Abrams expressed his ambition for Open USD settlement networks to process “hundreds of trillions of dollars a year” as stablecoins cement themselves as foundational infrastructure supporting global value transfer.
Originally published at https://www.coindesk.com/business/2026/09/24/open-usd-takes-on-tether-circle-with-a-different-stablecoin-model-that-s-building-money.
