Good morning and welcome to Kaupr Today!

The payments landscape is being rebuilt in real time. Stripe, Visa, and Mastercard are forming a stablecoin consortium. America's biggest banks are building shared blockchain infrastructure. Tether is turning gold into a spendable asset. Three fronts, one battle — and we cover all of them today.

In the background, a quieter story: gold has overtaken US Treasuries as the world's largest reserve asset, the euro is gaining ground as an international funding currency, and the US is inching toward a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve — at deliberately slow speed.

And for your Friday read: Kaupr has mapped eight ways people actually own crypto. Which one are you?

Stories in today's newsletter:

♦️ Stripe, Visa, Mastercard and Coinbase form a stablecoin consortium — Circle falls
♦️ JPMorgan and the big banks build their own blockchain network — targeting 2027. ♦️ Tether turns gold into a spendable, yieldable asset.
♦️ Gold overtook US Treasuries. The euro hit a record. Bitcoin waits in the wings.
♦️ Bitcoin is cheaper than 95.6% of its history. Bitwise says fair value is $224,000.
♦️ Eight ways to own crypto — which one are you?

Have a great read — and a great weekend

📖 Missed yesterday's edition? Thursday's Kaupr Today mapped a shift most people haven't noticed yet — crypto's new map, where AI tokens, privacy coins, and web3 neobanks are moving on their own fundamentals, independent of Bitcoin. Read it here: Crypto's new map — Thu 4 Jun

Stripe, Visa, Mastercard, and Coinbase are forming a consortium to launch a new stablecoin platform — a direct challenge to the Tether/Circle duopoly controlling roughly 80% of the $325 billion stablecoin market. No name, token details, or reserve structure has been disclosed. Stripe acquired Bridge for $1.1 billion in 2024; Mastercard acquired BVNK in 2026. Coinbase's participation is complicated by its existing USDC revenue-sharing arrangement with Circle.

Why it matters: The last time payments giants tried this, it was Facebook's Libra — which collapsed under regulatory pressure. The difference now: a friendlier regulatory environment, mature infrastructure, and companies that have already spent billions before announcing.

Source: Stripe, Visa, Mastercard, and Coinbase form consortium to launch stablecoin — Crypto Briefing

Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire told investors on June 4 not to take the consortium reports at face value, pointing to existing deep partnerships with Visa, Mastercard, Stripe, and Coinbase — all built around USDC. Stablecoin transactions on Stripe and a substantial portion of Visa's settlement activity already run on USDC. Allaire also unveiled Arc, a new Layer 1 blockchain described as "an operating system for the internet economy."

Why it matters: Allaire's response is a bet that network effects matter more than brand names. The question is whether the consortium's distribution power — Visa and Mastercard in 200+ countries — can overcome a two-year head start in onchain activity.

Source: Circle CEO says reports on Visa, Mastercard stablecoin alliance shouldn't be taken at face value — Bloomingbit

America's four largest banks are building a shared tokenized deposit network through The Clearing House, targeting launch in the first half of 2027. Deposits will move instantly across a blockchain around the clock — while staying inside the regulated banking system. The Clearing House CEO David Watson called it "a big move for the banks." JPMorgan already operates JPM Coin for institutional clients on Base. A blockchain vendor has not yet been chosen.

Why it matters: This is not an experiment — it is shared infrastructure built to defend banks' core role in payments against stablecoin encroachment. When JPMorgan, Citi, BofA, and Wells Fargo move together, the plumbing of global finance is being rebuilt.

Source: JPMorgan, Citi and big banks plan new tokenized deposit system to answer crypto — The Wall Street Journal

Going deeper: Why is Norway's largest bank sitting out the Qivalis stablecoin consortium — and building tokenized deposit infrastructure instead? Why DNB opted out of Qivalis — kaupr.io

Tether has launched a Visa card with Fasset that lets users spend Tether Gold (XAUT) anywhere Visa is accepted. At point-of-sale, XAUT converts instantly to USDT and then to fiat. Cardholders earn up to 6% cashback in XAUT in real-time, with a round-up feature that automatically reinvests spare change into tokenized gold. XAUT has a market cap of approximately $2.7 billion.

Why it matters: Tether is no longer just a dollar stablecoin issuer — it is systematically turning every major store of value into a spendable, yieldable digital asset. CEO Ardoino: "Historically, gold has been a store of value, not a medium of exchange. This initiative changes that narrative."

Source: Tether debuts tokenized gold stablecoin Visa card that pays out crypto rewards — Decrypt

Gold now represents 27% of global central bank reserves, overtaking US Treasuries at 22%, per the ECB's annual report. Central banks hold approximately $4 trillion in gold versus $3.9 trillion in US government bonds. The shift was driven by gold's near-70% price appreciation last year and sustained buying by China, Poland, Turkey, and India — accelerating after Washington froze Russia's reserves in 2022.

Why it matters: For the first time since the Bretton Woods era, gold — not US government debt — is the world's most held reserve asset. That is a structural signal about confidence in sovereign debt.

Source: How gold overtook US Treasuries as number-one reserve asset — MarketWatch / Morningstar

International debt issuance in euros rose 30% in 2025 to nearly €1 trillion — the highest since the euro's inception, per the ECB. Foreign investors added a net €850 billion to euro-area assets. Bond issuance by US firms in euros surged almost 50% as corporates capitalised on tight spreads and favourable costs relative to the dollar.

Why it matters: The euro is not replacing the dollar — but it is gaining ground as a genuine alternative for international financing. For Nordic and Baltic firms, a deeper euro capital market changes the cost and availability of funding.

Source: Euro debt issuance hits record high as EU strives to supplant US dollar — Euractiv

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told the Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday that the Clarity Act must pass before the summer recess. On the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve — currently holding approximately 207,000 BTC from criminal forfeitures — he said the process is moving with "deliberate speed." The "big announcement" teased in April has not yet materialised.

Why it matters: The US is positioning Bitcoin as a strategic reserve asset alongside gold and Treasuries — while the same administration pumps the brakes on active accumulation. Deliberate speed is not fast speed.

Source: Bessent backs summer push for Clarity Act, says bitcoin reserve moving at 'deliberate speed' — The Block

Bitcoin's decline below $66,000 has pushed it to the lower boundary of the Power Law corridor. The Power Law Oscillator stands at 4.4% — meaning bitcoin is priced cheaper than 95.6% of all historical readings relative to its long-term trend. Previous visits to this level coincided with the March 2020 crash and the FTX collapse — both of which preceded significant recoveries.

Why it matters: The model offers no guarantee, but at this reading, long-term investors are looking at one of the deepest historical discounts to trend ever recorded.

Source: Bitcoin hits Power Law level low that historically precedes a rebound — CoinDesk

Bitwise Europe applies the Greg Foss framework — treating bitcoin as a credit default swap on G20 sovereign bonds — and arrives at a theoretical fair value of $224,000. The firm is explicit: an illustrative model, not a price target. The case rests on record Japanese bond yields, 10-year swap spreads at their highest since the 2011–12 European debt crisis, and IMF warnings that governments will borrow $29 trillion this year.

Why it matters: Bitcoin's market-value-to-realized-value ratio sits in the lower half of its historical range, while the Nasdaq 100's price-to-book is at an all-time high. That divergence is, by Bitwise's count, one of the most extreme on record.

Source: Bitwise model puts bitcoin fair value at $224,000 as sovereign-default hedge — CoinDesk

Kaupr has mapped eight investor archetypes covering the full spectrum of crypto ownership — from the sovereign Bitcoin maximalist with cold storage and zero counterparty tolerance, to the convenience-driven ETP saver who just wants a ticker on a familiar screen. In between: the memecoin speculator, the protocol investor staking on Ethereum, the high-net-worth brokerage client, the wealth advisory client, the equity-driven pure play investor, and the financially curious everyday saver.

Why it matters: The crypto market is not one thing — and neither are its investors. Understanding which archetype you are — or which your clients are — is increasingly a strategic question, not just a personal one.

Source: Eight ways to own crypto — which one are you? — Kaupr

🎙 Kaupr Weekly — on your favourite platform

A new episode drops each weekend — four episodes so far. Kaupr Weekly is Morten Myrstad's short, news-oriented podcast on the week's biggest stories in crypto and fintech.

Thank you for reading Kaupr Today. If you find this briefing useful, please share it with a colleague or friend who should be following Nordic and European digital‑finance news more closely.

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Wishing you a great Friday and a wonderful weekend — see you Monday morning for the next edition of Kaupr Today.

Best regards Morten Myrstad Founder & Editor