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Who Doesn’t Love a Good Sandwich?
Roxie’s, Little Lucca’s, and Lou’s Café in the SF Bay Area—I still remember those old punch cards. Ten sandwiches, one free. Simple. They worked. They kept me coming back, and the shop kept my loyalty.
Rewards have changed since then. They turned into points, apps, and digital wallets. But what if they became money?
That’s where we are headed. Businesses can now issue their own branded stablecoins. Not points. Not paper punch cards. Real digital dollars, backed by reserves, liquid across multiple blockchains, and integrated into a growing financial ecosystem. Companies like Agora makes this possible in days, not months. We even came across a few companies in Singapore and in India.
What’s New
Businesses no longer have to settle for points-based loyalty or expensive, custom-built crypto infrastructure. Agora now offers a white-label platform enabling any enterprise—financial institutions, fintechs, or retailers—to launch their own branded stablecoin in days, not months. These tokens, fully backed by AUSD reserves, operate across multiple blockchains like Ethereum, Solana, and Polygon.
The current administration recently passed the GENIUS Act (July 18, 2025), America’s first federal stablecoin legislation, signaling substantial regulatory support for innovation and stablecoin adoption. This creates the most favorable environment yet for businesses to innovate in digital payments. Investors agree: Agora raised $50 million in a Series A round led by Paradigm and Dragonfly Capital to meet soaring demand for turnkey branded stablecoin solutions.
Time to change compliance forever.
We’re thrilled to announce our $32M Series A at a $300M valuation, led by Insight Partners!
Delve is shaping the future of GRC with an AI-native approach that cuts busywork and saves teams hundreds of hours. Startups like Lovable, Bland, and Browser trust our AI to get compliant—fast.
To celebrate, we’re giving back with 3 limited-time offers:
$15,000 referral bonus if you refer a founding engineer we hire
$2,000 off compliance setup for new customers – claim here
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Thank you for your support—this is just the beginning.
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What This Means for Consumers
Short Term (6–12 months)
Expect to see early adopters—retail brands, neobanks, and fintech apps—launching branded stablecoins for payments and rewards.
Loyalty programs evolve into real digital dollars that hold actual value and can move across platforms.
Medium Term (1–3 years)
Branded stablecoins are starting to appear in everyday transactions: paying for groceries, streaming subscriptions, or gaming credits.
Cross-platform interoperability becomes the norm, allowing consumers to move branded tokens between ecosystems without losing value.
Long Term (3–7 years)
Consumers begin to treat branded stablecoins as primary payment options, similar to debit cards or mobile wallets today.
The shift gives consumers financial products with yield benefits, lower transaction costs, and global accessibility.
What SMBs Must Consider Before Launching a Stablecoin
Regulatory Compliance: GENIUS Act sets a national standard, but state-level compliance and KYC/AML obligations still matter.
Liquidity and Redemption: How easy will it be for customers to redeem tokens for cash or use them outside your ecosystem?
Brand Strategy: Branded stablecoins aren’t just tech—they’re a marketing and customer retention tool. The experience needs to align with your brand identity.
Revenue Opportunity: Yield-sharing on reserves can boost margins, but businesses must disclose how it works to maintain trust.
Operational Readiness: Even with a turnkey platform like Agora, SMBs need internal champions to drive adoption, educate customers, and measure ROI.
By the Numbers
$50 million: Agora’s recent funding round underscores strong investor confidence in branded stablecoin platforms.
$27.6 trillion: Total value moved by stablecoins in 2024, surpassing combined annual transaction volumes of Visa and Mastercard by over 7% and highlighting the essential nature of stablecoins as a payment rail.
81%: The percentage of crypto-aware SMBs interested in using stablecoins to address payment inefficiencies, from cross-border transfers to lower fees.
500 million: Number of global wallets using stablecoins, with sharp growth in corporate and emerging market sectors.
$7 billion: Stablecoins’ average daily transaction volume in 2024, an 8% increase from 2023.
Did You Know?
Stablecoins now process more on-chain transaction volume than Bitcoin and Ethereum combined, thanks to their core role in trading, DeFi, payments, and settlements. Currently, USDT and USDC are the dominant stablecoins, but the landscape is evolving as platforms like Agora empower businesses to issue compliant, branded tokens. These branded stablecoins allow companies to capture customer loyalty, unlock new revenue, and stay risk-compliant within an improved regulatory framework.
With stablecoins forming the backbone of tokenized finance, the next big branded token—perhaps 25VUSD—could be just on the horizon.
For businesses, it's about more than flavor: it’s about keeping customers engaged and ready for the future of money.
xoxo,
Maximillian Diez
GP, Twenty Five Ventures
P.S. Stay with me on this journey.
If nothing else, thanks for reading.
