MVB Partners With Velocity for Visa Direct Stablecoin Settlement Pilot

MVB Financial has partnered with Velocity to join a Visa Direct pilot supporting stablecoin-enabled funding and settlement for push-to-card payouts, Velocity said in a Wednesday (Sept. 9) press release.

MVB, which is a banking partner to FinTechs and innovation-driven companies, and Velocity, which offers a stablecoin-powered enterprise payments and treasury platform, aim to support financial institutions that want to use stablecoin rails under existing banking and payments infrastructure to move and deploy liquidity while preserving familiar controls, relationships and systems, according to the release.

Through their partnership, MVB will use stablecoin payments to settle its Visa Direct payouts. Bringing stablecoin liquidity directly into the company’s banking and payments operations will enable more flexible pre-positioning and settlement options across its customers and MVB itself, the release said.

The partnership of MVB and Velocity lays the groundwork for MVB to leverage stablecoin infrastructure for a range of treasury, settlement and payment use cases, per the release.

“Banking is being rebuilt in real time, and stablecoins are at the center of that transformation,” MVB Financial CEO Larry F. Mazza said in the release. “By allowing stablecoins to solve inefficiencies in capital movement for payouts, we’re giving our clients faster, more flexible ways to use money.”

Velocity Founder and CEO Eric Queathem said in the release that stablecoins become most meaningful when they become part of businesses’ existing financial infrastructure.

“MVB has built its business around serving some of the most forward-thinking companies in payments and FinTech, and we’re excited to help bring these capabilities directly into that ecosystem,” Queathem said. “Visa Direct is a powerful starting point because it shows how stablecoin liquidity can connect directly into established global payment rails.”

PYMNTS reported in November that Visa is embracing multirail innovation, such as integrating stablecoins and artificial intelligence into traditional systems through services like Visa Direct, to offer faster, flexible payments without requiring a bank account.

In December, Visa began rolling out stablecoin settlement in the United States, allowing its U.S. issuer and acquirer partners to settle with Visa in Circle’s USDC stablecoin. Visa said at the time that USDC settlement provides issuers with near-instant funds movement, seven-day settlement availability and enhanced operational resilience across weekends and holidays.