If you follow stablecoin news long enough, you might notice a pattern: every week, someone announces a major partnership, a new integration, or the future of payments. And you can’t help but wonder — how does a partnership actually happen in Web3? Is there a strategy? A limited partnership structure? Or maybe someone just sent a box of croissants to the right founder?
Behind every polished announcement is the messy, very real process of aligning regulations, technology, liquidity, user needs, and business incentives. Payments make this even more interesting because, unlike many parts of crypto in 2025, stablecoins actually work at scale.
To break down how partnerships in this space really come together, we spoke with Lyubomyr Pavlyk, Strategic Web3 Partnerships Executive at CoinsPaid. He’s been in Web3 since 2016 — investing, co-founding, building infrastructure — and now focuses on connecting blockchains, stablecoin issuers, and wallets with the needs of global merchants.
This conversation looks at the real mechanics behind integrations, why some deals never happen, and what Web3 infrastructure still gets wrong.
Stablecoin Partnerships in the New Regulatory Landscape
You recently announced the integration of USDG into the CoinsPaid ecosystem. What behind-the-scenes partnership dynamics drove that decision, and what resistance or trade-offs came up when aligning a stablecoin issuer with merchant acceptance?
Over the last 18 months, two things quietly flipped the board: regulatory clarity and the real-world scale of stablecoins.
Digital dollars and euros now settle like the internet — global, instant, 24/7. In the US, the Genius Act created the first federal framework for payment stablecoins in July 2025. In the EU, MiCA took effect earlier: June 2024 for stablecoins and December 2024 for the broader crypto market.
This combination turned crypto payments into a compliance-friendly, cost-saving upgrade.
When we looked at this new clarity, Paxos — the issuer behind USDG — stood out. They’re one of the most regulated stablecoin issuers in the US, recently received their MiCA license, and clearly understand how to operate responsibly in this market.
They also introduced native yield. Companies can earn yield simply by holding USDG — no staking, no third-party steps.
We already had a strong relationship with the USDG team and were among the first 20 network partners in Europe. Because the product is mature, the compliance is solid, and the integrations run on Solana with extremely low fees, there were almost no trade-offs on our side.
Of course, merchants have their preferences. USDT and USDC remain the most used stablecoins. But adding well-regulated, cost-efficient options helps merchants improve UX, speed, and costs, which keeps us at the frontline of global instant payments.
We hear about brands rushing into Web3, but not about those that walk away. What are the most common reasons a crypto-brand partnership doesn’t happen, and what red flags tell you it’s not worth pursuing?
In my work, we do due diligence before we even start discussing partnerships. We check whether our goals align, whether the company is compliant, and whether they fit the regulatory environment, which has been the key topic for the last two years.
Then we look at the tech. You can’t build a successful partnership if our merchants can’t rely on it afterward.
And we look at the team. People who care, who don’t drag compliance work for months, who move fast — that’s important. With USDG, for example, the team was extremely professional and quick.
So most red flags are filtered out before the first call. I assume strong companies on the other side do the same.
With MiCA and new global frameworks rolling out, how has the compliance environment changed your approach to partner selection?
MiCA is still relatively new, so it’s not the number-one filter yet, but it’s always part of the selection. Any major player operating in Europe either already has a MiCA license or is in the process of getting it.
As a big payment provider, we must be compliant ourselves. So we look closely at whether potential partners are compliant. That’s now one of the key criteria.
Infrastructure partnerships and stablecoin value creation
Merchants want profit, users want better UX. What’s the practical formula for a partnership that creates visible value for both sides?
For users — meaning both our merchants and their end users — it’s very easy to measure value. Compared to fiat, stablecoin payments come with fees measured in cents, not percentages.
On Solana, who are our partners as well, a typical transaction costs a fraction of a cent. On Ethereum L2s like Base, fees are also very low. Combined with near-instant settlement, 24/7 availability, and no banking delays, the value is clear.
Major players already support this: Visa expanded USDC settlements to Solana, CryptoProcessing by CoinsPaid integrated Base and Arbitrum L2s, and Stripe re-enabled crypto payments with USDC across Solana and Ethereum.
In your experience, which type of partnership produces more sustainable growth: deep infrastructure integrations or lighter product-layer collaborations like token support or co-marketing?
Right now, it’s definitely infrastructure.
Around 86% of the processed volume of CryptoProcessing by CoinsPaid is in stablecoins, and stablecoins depend on issuers, blockchain rails, liquidity providers, wallets, and custody solutions. That’s where long-term value comes from.
CoinsPaid connects wallets, chains, and merchants, yet not every ecosystem is ready to plug in. What’s still missing from Web3 infrastructure that blocks the partnerships you want to build, and who needs to fix it first?
Sometimes the technology is great, but the project has too few users or not enough liquidity. That can block a partnership even if the product is technically strong.
We only consider big projects that can serve large user bases. If a project doesn’t have enough users or liquidity yet, we keep the conversation open for the future, when they’re ready.
CoinsPaid is a leader in payment processing, and Solana is a leader in blockchain rails — that’s why our partnership works perfectly. We’re now finalizing an even broader agreement, though I can’t share details yet.
From a business perspective, what’s the first signal that a partnership is creating real user value, and which metrics do you track internally?
It’s simple: are merchants using the technology?
We don’t take political decisions or have preferences for specific chains or stablecoins. We just look at raw data — what our merchants use, what their clients use, and what we use internally.
That’s the clearest indicator.
Do you use any techniques to check what users want or need?
Not formally, because user behavior is the best signal. I’m personally a user of many crypto products — wallets, payments, stablecoins — and if something is faster, cheaper, and works perfectly, that’s all the “user testing” you need.
People don’t care whether their payment goes through Visa or Mastercard. They care about speed, cost, and reliability.
Crypto payments already solve many pain points better than traditional systems.
The future of crypto payments
Looking at where global payments are heading, which sectors will reach the point where not accepting crypto is bad for business, not innovation, but necessity?
Real estate is at the top of the list. At some point, I don’t think players in that industry will be able to avoid crypto payments.
E-commerce is another strong candidate. When people have multiple payment options, they choose whatever is most convenient. Crypto becomes just another button. It’s already there in many cases — it’s just that some industries are still catching up mentally.
We started with crypto being something new, almost experimental. Now we’re moving toward it being just another standard payment method. That’s where things are heading.
