TL;DR
- Coinbase and Citi are expanding their partnership to connect stablecoin payments with regulated banking infrastructure.
- Citi’s institutional clients can accept stablecoins through Spring by Citi, while Coinbase converts the digital assets into fiat for settlement.
- Coinbase is also using Citi’s Virtual Account Wallet for business accounts that can automatically convert incoming fiat into stablecoins, creating a closer link between traditional finance and blockchain payments.
Coinbase and Citi are expanding their partnership to connect stablecoin payments with traditional banking infrastructure, giving corporate clients a way to accept digital-dollar payments with fiat settlement. The arrangement also adds bank-account-like functionality for businesses.
The collaboration links Coinbase’s payment rails with Citi’s regulated banking network. Citi’s institutional clients can accept stablecoins through Spring by Citi, its merchant-processing platform, while Coinbase handles conversion into government-issued currency before Citi settles the funds as the bank of record. This allows merchants to offer stablecoin checkout without directly managing stablecoin balances.
Coinbase also selected Citi’s Virtual Account Wallet to power Coinbase Virtual Accounts. These accounts let customers accept, hold and send funds, while incoming fiat can be converted into stablecoins. Coinbase said the initiatives will launch first in the United States.
Coinbase And Citi Build A Fiat-Stablecoin Bridge
The partnership builds on an agreement announced in October 2025, when the companies began exploring digital-asset payment capabilities for institutional clients. Their initial work focused on fiat pay-ins and pay-outs, payment orchestration and improved on- and off-ramps between traditional currencies and digital assets.
The latest expansion brings those plans into commercial payments. Coinbase said its infrastructure reaches more than 150 million stablecoin holders, while Citi operates across more than 180 countries and jurisdictions. The combination could simplify movement between bank money and blockchain-based payments.
Stablecoins are increasingly used for settlement, cross-border transfers and treasury activity because they can move value on blockchain networks while maintaining a stable reference to currencies such as the U.S. dollar. Coinbase has also expanded its payments infrastructure through partnerships with Nium and Checkout.com, showing how stablecoins are moving beyond trading into business payment workflows.
Citi Expands Its Digital Asset Infrastructure
Citi has been developing blockchain-based services alongside traditional banking. Its Citi Token Services platform supports institutional payments and liquidity management, while the bank has also expanded efforts around digital custody and tokenized securities.
In August, Citi said its Custody+ platform would support native digital assets, beginning with Bitcoin. The bank has also launched Digital Depositary Receipts representing shares in private companies, using regulated blockchain infrastructure.
