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Vin Cooper
Vin Cooper

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Bitcoin’s Settlement Layer Is Now Comparable to Visa + Mastercard

Bitcoin’s settlement throughput hit a new structural milestone:
$6.9T over the last 90 days, matching Visa + Mastercard combined.

Even after removing internal exchange churn (Glassnode’s “economic volume”), Bitcoin still settles $7.8B/day — a significant footprint for a non-custodial, globally distributed network.

On top of that, stablecoins introduce a high-frequency transactional layer.
The top five stablecoins move $225B/day, driven by automated arbitrage systems, liquidity routing, and smart-contract-based settlement.

Taken together, Bitcoin (L0 value layer) + stablecoins (L0.5 transactional layer) represent a functional, two-tier financial system operating in parallel to traditional rails.

But the most interesting part isn’t the infrastructure itself — it’s the demographic using it natively.

Gen Z has >51% crypto exposure, the highest of any cohort.
They interact with wallets as the primary interface, not banks. Crypto cards like WhiteBIT Nova Card bridge on-chain value with real-world spending via instant conversion systems. Stablecoins serve as their default cross-border mechanism.

This generation demonstrates what a user-driven transition to programmable money looks like.
While policymakers still debate definitions, Gen Z is already transacting inside an internet-native settlement architecture.

The system is evolving — and the first wave of real mainstream users has already arrived.

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