- Stablecoin volumes will hit $1.5 quadrillion by 2035, said Chainaysis.
- Projection hinges on $100 trillion wealth transfer to crypto-native generation.
- Transaction counts could match Visa and Mastercard by the mid 2030s.
One-and-a-half quadrillion dollars.
That’s how much Chainalysis reckons stablecoins could process in annual payment volumes by 2035. The blockchain surveillance company estimates that stablecoins processed $28 trillion in real economic activity in 2025, a figure that has grown at a whopping 133% compound annual growth over the past three years.
If that baseline growth continues, volumes could reach $719 trillion by 2035.
A new report by Chainalysis factors in two broad macro shifts — generational wealth transfer and crypto integration into merchants’ point-of-sales — sending the figure to $1.5 quadrillion.
To put that number into perspective, $1.5 quadrillion is more than the combined value of all global real estate, all publicly traded stocks, and every government bond on earth.
It would represent a fundamental restructuring of how money moves, with stablecoins rivalling Visa and Mastercard as core payment infrastructure. Traditional financial institutions would need to either build onchain rails or watch trillions in transaction volume migrate to crypto-native competitors.
British-based firm Standard Chartered estimates that stablecoins will grow to $2 trillion by 2028. Today, they are worth around $317 billion, according to DefiLlama.
Generational wealth transfer
The first catalyst is demographic, said Chainalysis.
Between 2028 and 2048, an estimated $100 trillion will move from Baby Boomers — the generation born between 1946 and 1964 — to Millennials and Gen Z — the two generations born between 1981 to 2012. Nearly half of millennials and Gen Z have held or currently hold crypto, according to 2025 Gemini survey data.
Chainalysis estimates this wealth transition alone could add $508 trillion to annual stablecoin transaction volumes by 2035.
Last year, banking giant Charles Schwab surveyed 2,200 investors, and 62% of millennials said they were going to invest in cryptocurrencies.
Infrastructure
The second key driver is infrastructure.
As stablecoin acceptance becomes the norm at storefronts and e-commerce, paying with crypto will shift from a deliberate choice to the default payment infrastructure, said Chainalysis. Think of it as the same transition consumers have made to credit cards from cash.
Chainalysis projects that adding stablecoin payments to point-of-sale merchants could add another $232 trillion in annual volumes by 2035.
Aggressive assumptions
To be sure, Chainalysis $1.5 quadrillion forecast draws on some pretty aggressive assumptions.
For one, it assumes Millennials and Gen Z will route a significant portion of inherited wealth through stablecoin payments rather than traditional assets.
“Nearly half have held or currently hold crypto” doesn't necessarily translate into using stablecoins for everyday transactions.
Meanwhile, point-of-sale adoption faces structural barriers that include regulatory uncertainty, consumer habits favouring existing payment methods, and network effects built over decades by Visa and Mastercard.
Sustaining 133% annual growth for a decade would also be unprecedented. Indeed, few payment technologies are able to maintain that sort of exponential growth at scale over long periods of time.
Pedro Solimano is a markets correspondent with DL News. Got a tip? Email him at psolimano@dlnews.com.
