PayPal has expanded its PYUSD stablecoin to the Solana blockchain, enhancing transaction efficiency and targeting new payment use cases, according to a May 28 announcement.

PayPal Expands PYUSD to Solana, Enhancing Efficiency and Broadening Payment Use Cases Beyond Ethereum

In expanding its stablecoin, PayPal USD, PayPal has selected the Solana blockchain, its first foray outside the Ethereum ecosystem.

As per a declaration made on May 28 (via Cointelegraph), the inclusion of PYUSD in the Solana network enables users to conduct transactions with reduced expenses. With this action, the PYUSD stablecoin's utility as a payment method for daily and minor transactions is intended to be broadened.

Solana exhibits a transaction throughput of 65,000 per second at a minimal cost of $0.0025, notably surpassing Ethereum's 15 transactions per second for $50 (USD) during periods of congestion. An Ethereum transaction may require several minutes, whereas an equivalent transfer executed over Solana could be concluded in under one minute.

"Making PYUSD available on the Solana Blockchain furthers our mission of enabling a digital currency with a stable value designed for commerce and payments," PayPal's senior vice president of blockchain, Jose Fernandez da Ponte, said in a statement.

PayPal and Venmo wallet holders can utilize a chain-agnostic interface, which entails unifying PYUSD balances regardless of the network that houses the assets.

Since the previous year, the Solana network has become the most popular blockchain for stablecoin transfers. Artemis, an analytics platform, reports that the volume of stablecoin transfers on Solana amounted to $1.5 trillion in the preceding year, significantly exceeding Ethereum's volume of $885 billion during the same time frame.

Solana Faces Network Disruptions, Plans Upgrade; PayPal Introduces Stablecoin PYUSD with Paxos

Additionally, the Solana blockchain encounters obstacles, primarily in the form of recurrent network disruptions. The most recent incident occurred on February 9, during which transactions were interrupted for approximately five hours. In the future months, an upgrade known as Firedancer will be released to enhance Solana's overall dependability and scalability.

Stablecoins are cryptocurrencies pegged to a more stable reserve asset, typically a fiat currency such as the U.S. dollar, to preserve their value.

In August 2023, PayPal introduced its stablecoin in partnership with Paxos Trust Company. As an ERC-20 token, the stablecoin was initially issued exclusively on Ethereum. U.S. dollar deposits, short-term Treasury bills, and currency equivalents support it.

According to DefiLlama data, Tether has a market capitalization of around $111 billion, accounting for nearly 70% of the stablecoin market. In contrast, the present value of PYUSD stands at $272.96 million.

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