The bull case is clean. Stablecoins have been fast and cheap for years, but they sat behind exchange accounts, seed phrases and app downloads. Solana Foundation president Lily Liu says stablecoins were missing a path to mainstream adoption, and that Samsung’s partnership supplies it. Borderless CEO Kevin Lehtiniitty goes further: “Mass adoption was never going to come from people downloading crypto apps.” He expects Apple and Google to follow.
The product design backs the argument. Samsung charges no fee on transfers to compatible external wallets, and recipients can receive local currency in bank accounts in more than 60 countries without opening a crypto wallet. Users never manage private keys. Bastion handles regulated custody, with Coinbase as sub-custodian. Senders must pass identity verification and biometric authentication. Institutions are drifting toward the same logic. The IMF’s annual report credits low costs for the expansion of cross-border stablecoin use this year. Even the BIS acknowledges that stablecoins offer cross-border accessibility and lower transaction costs. Sui, citing Visa research, says 41% of US remittance users surveyed were likely to use stablecoins. That is stated interest, not a forecast of Samsung’s uptake.