According to ChainCatcher, Raafi Hossain, co-founder and CEO of Fasset, a Middle Eastern fintech company aiming to enter the stablecoin space, introduced several examples of customers using stablecoins, including the sale of a $8 million Dubai property, Tanzanian buyers purchasing Indonesian cooking oil, renting a villa on Palm Jumeirah for $100,000, and private yacht rentals. Fasset is a 'super app' based in Dubai, focusing on markets from Morocco to Malaysia.
Dubai's Careem Networks FZ LLC, which provides taxi, food, and financial services, and Abu Dhabi's Astra Tech, which owns the communication app Botim, are also exploring the launch of payment tools supported by stablecoins.
Hossain stated that stablecoins provide users with a way to 'efficiently and quickly conduct high-value transactions while bypassing geographical and institutional barriers.'
Mohammad El Saadi, Vice President of Careem Pay, stated that the technology 'has the potential to reduce costs, speed up processing times, and improve working capital management for cross-border transfers.' The company has opened 8 new fiat payment channels in the UAE over the past 11 months.
Meanwhile, Astra Tech's Vice President of Products Rishabh Singh stated that Botim has been experimenting with AE Coin, which is pegged to the dirham and has been approved by the Central Bank of the UAE.
According to data from DeFi Llama, the total market capitalization of all circulating stablecoins has grown from less than $140 billion at the end of 2023 to over $200 billion today.
So far, the dominant stablecoin is USDT, whose issuer Tether Holdings Ltd. recently stated it expects to achieve over $10 billion in net profit in 2024. According to CoinGecko data, the total circulating supply of USDT is close to $140 billion.
The use of USDT is concentrated in the Europe, Middle East, and Africa time zones, particularly in the Middle East. (Bloomberg)