The United States is considering pushing dollar-backed stablecoins into overseas markets through joint ventures with private companies, rather than building the infrastructure itself. The goal is twofold: strengthen the dollar’s position as the world’s dominant currency, and create more buyers for US Treasuries at a time when demand for American debt from traditional sources has been shrinking.
A dollar-backed stablecoin has to hold real dollars, or short-term US government debt, to back every token it issues. The more people around the world use these stablecoins, especially in countries with weaker local currencies, the more Treasuries get bought to back them. Handing the expansion to private companies rather than a government agency lets Washington grow that demand without adding a formal state-backed currency to the mix.
The US is considering pushing dollar-backed stablecoins overseas through joint ventures with private companies.
The goal is to strengthen the dollar’s global position and create more demand for US Treasuries.
Meanwhile, China is expanding its digital yuan infrastructure and… pic.twitter.com/LPWGP5PJ05
— CryptoSavingExpert ® (@CryptoSavingExp) September 24, 2026
China is running the same play, just with its own currency and banks
While Washington is looking to private companies to expand the dollar overseas, Beijing is pursuing a similar goal through its state-backed financial system.
On June 17, Wang Xin, director-general of the Research Bureau at the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), said Chinese policymakers are paying closer attention to the potential role of stablecoins in cross-border payments and the wider international monetary system.
At the same time, China is building the infrastructure to grow the yuan’s use across borders. In June 2026, the PBOC brought the first group of 26 banks and financial institutions onto CBETS, a platform designed to support round-the-clock cross-border payments in digital yuan with foreign banks and central banks.
The rollout already covers Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, Laos, Thailand, the UAE, Qatar and Brazil, with more countries expected to follow, and much of the push is aimed at countries along China’s Belt and Road trade routes. Standard Chartered’s China CEO called it a way to make cross-border payments faster and push the yuan’s international use further, and industry sources briefed on the plan described it as Beijing is setting itself on a different, and possibly competing, path from the US in shaping how money moves globally.
The US model leans on betting that market incentives will do the expansion work. China’s model runs on betting that central coordination spreads the yuan faster and with more control over where it goes.
Can foreign users create new demand for US Treasuries?
Under the GENIUS Act, the law the US passed to regulate stablecoins, issuers are required to back their tokens only with cash, short-term Treasury bills, or similarly safe, easily sellable assets, which effectively locks in new Treasury demand as more tokens get issued.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said he expects the stablecoin market to reach around 2 trillion dollars, and Tether alone already held about 117 billion dollars in US Treasury bills as of earlier this year, proof the mechanism already works at a meaningful scale.
The growth Washington actually wants comes from somewhere else entirely, someone converting Turkish lira, Nigerian naira, or Argentine pesos into a dollar stablecoin. New money enters the dollar system from outside it, and every one of those conversions becomes fresh demand for US government debt.
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