Among all offline exhibitions this year, stablecoin payments and U-cards remain one of the most discussed topics.

For ordinary users, the logic behind such products is straightforward: link the balance of stablecoins in a wallet to a card, enabling consumption at merchants just like using a traditional bank card. Users see only a physical card; but for service providers, the card is merely the front-end touchpoint. Behind it lies an entire system encompassing card issuance, fund conversion, transaction authorization, clearing and settlement, compliance, anti-money laundering (AML), anti-fraud mechanisms, and ongoing operations.

When this capability is applied to cross-border payroll, ad procurement, platform revenue distribution, supplier payments, and corporate expense management, the question shifts from "can stablecoins be spent?" to "can enterprises truly integrate stablecoins into their daily operations?"

This is precisely the core perspective through which Vernal Capital co-founder Du Jun evaluates stablecoin payments and his investment in WasabiCard.

From co-founding Huobi, to jointly establishing ChainUp—a technology solutions provider for enterprises—down to launching investment activities, Du Jun’s career spans both user-facing trading platforms and financial infrastructure serving businesses.[1] This background enables him to assess projects not merely by their ability to rapidly acquire users, but by asking a fundamental question:

Is it solving a real, persistent demand? Can the capabilities it builds be used long-term by more enterprises?

In this interview, Du Jun explains that Vernal Capital continuously monitors developments in crypto trading and payments, while also observing opportunities in AI application layers. Their investment thesis isn’t solely focused on financial returns, but also emphasizes strategic alignment with existing business operations.

To him, the most compelling direction in stablecoin payments is gradually shifting from "who can issue more cards" to "who can handle more enterprise payment workflows."

WasabiCard is betting on the latter.

One: From a Single U-Card to an Enterprise Fund Operations System

The popularity of U-cards has provided a tangible entry point for stablecoins into everyday spending.

Yet, in Du Jun’s view, consumer-facing card issuance is only part of the payment market. For C-end products, customer acquisition and service capability determine whether the business can launch. But once scale expands, it’s technical platforms, payment channels, risk control systems, clearing and settlement capacity, and customer support that decide whether the business can sustainably operate.

Cards can be launched quickly, but infrastructure cannot be built overnight.

Especially when payment capabilities evolve from personal consumption to enterprise operations, complexity increases significantly. Enterprises don’t just need to “send money out”—they require integration into existing processes, reconciliation handling, access for recipients across regions, compliance adherence, and clear accountability for responding to transaction anomalies.

Thus, once stablecoin payments enter enterprise scenarios, they are no longer a single-point product—they become a full-fledged fund operations capability.

Scenarios Du Jun mentioned in the interview confirm this shift: entertainment companies paying content creators or freelancers across countries, enterprises procuring advertising services, foreign trade firms managing cross-border payments, and AI-related account and service payments.

These enterprises may not care about how blockchain technology works under the hood. What matters to them is whether they can complete payments, receipts, and settlements at a suitable cost and with greater stability.

WasabiCard’s appeal lies precisely in its offering—not just a card to end-users, but foundational capabilities for card issuance and fund distribution to fintech platforms, internet companies, and cross-border clients. Enterprises retain their own users, brand identity, and business context, while delegating card issuance, fund orchestration, payment channels, and parts of post-launch operations to an infrastructure platform.

This transforms the investment evaluation from “how many users can this card attract?” to “how many enterprises can sustainably use this capability?”

Du Jun notes a telling detail: some card issuance teams seeking investment actually rely on WasabiCard’s underlying infrastructure.

This indicates that WasabiCard’s capabilities have already been embedded into other companies’ real-world operations. Customers aren’t joining for hype or concepts—they’re leveraging its infrastructure and service strength to solve actual payment challenges within their businesses.

Speaking of WasabiCard, Du Jun says: “Its business model is already proven.”

For a startup, that statement carries significant weight. Investors can’t predict long-term outcomes based solely on limited historical data, but they can observe: Is the demand real? Are customers willing to keep using it? Does the team have the capability to deliver consistently?

“This business model, I really like,” Du Jun says.

Two: Why Now? Stablecoins Are Integrating Into Real-World Payment Systems

Placing this investment in the context of the 2024–2025 industry landscape clarifies Du Jun’s judgment.

On June 30, 2024, regulations under the EU’s MiCA concerning asset-referenced tokens and electronic money tokens became applicable. Stablecoin issuance and market access now operate under a clearer regulatory framework.[7]

Entering 2025, connections between traditional payment institutions and stablecoin infrastructure deepened further. On February 4, Stripe announced its acquisition of Bridge; on April 30, Visa and Bridge jointly announced a partnership to launch card products, allowing developers to enable stablecoin-linked cards in multiple countries via a single API integration—initially covering six Latin American markets.[8][9]

Though regulation, payment platforms, and card networks appear to operate at different levels, they collectively point toward one direction: stablecoins are being integrated into established international commercial and payment systems.

This does not mean stablecoins have replaced traditional payment networks. On the contrary, it suggests that future competition will increasingly center around the layer connecting traditional finance and on-chain funds.

For enterprises aiming to participate in this space, technical integration is only the starting point. The organization of payment channels, risk management, compliance implementation, and sustained service delivery are the true barriers to long-term operation.

Du Jun does not attribute his assessment of WasabiCard to any single regulatory policy or industry merger. Instead, he focuses on whether real commercial demand emerges behind capital flow trends, and whether the founding team can establish a clear, sustainable business model during this process.

From this perspective, competition in stablecoin payments is not merely product-based—it’s a battle for infrastructure capability.

Three: Enterprise Payments Are the Most Valuable Segment of Stablecoin Demand

Du Jun explicitly expressed his optimism toward stablecoin payments and clearing and settlement directions in the interview.

Yet he also cautioned that on-chain data inevitably contains “noise”—transaction volume growth should not be equated directly with genuine payment demand. For investors, what matters isn’t just seeing rapidly rising numbers, but identifying which fund flows can form long-term, sustainable business models.

According to institutional research, enterprise demand is becoming a key driver of stablecoin payments.

Allium’s public summary of its State of Stablecoins and Payments, released in September 2026, estimates stablecoin payment volumes for the first eight months of 2026 to range between $40.1 billion and $52.7 billion—up 42% to 63% year-on-year. Enterprise payees accounted for 58% to 64% of total payment volume, with B2B clearing and settlement reaching approximately $13.7 billion to $15.3 billion.[2]

The significance of these figures lies not in proving that stablecoin payments are fully mature, but in showing that payment demand has entered enterprise operations: supplier payments, service fees, salary disbursements, and fund management are recurring business activities—not one-off consumer experiments.

Naturally, these figures must be interpreted with caution. Allium’s payment volume is an estimate, not equivalent to total on-chain transfers, nor directly indicative of the stablecoin card market size.

But at minimum, they signal clearly: enterprise fund flows are emerging as a major source of stablecoin payment demand.

For enterprise clients, payments are never isolated actions. Whether funds can be transferred is just the first step. More importantly, can payments integrate into existing workflows? Are transaction records easy to reconcile? Can recipients across regions access the funds? And when anomalies occur, is there reliable service support?

Only when stablecoin liquidity combines with enterprise-grade service capabilities can truly sustainable payment businesses emerge.

This also explains why WasabiCard’s ToB approach deserves attention. Its clients are not only end-cardholders, but also fintech and internet platforms needing card issuance capabilities, and enterprises requiring cross-border payments and fund distribution.

It targets not short-term card hype, but pre-existing, growing operational needs within enterprises.

Four: Behind the Growth of Stablecoin Cards Lies a Battle of Operational Capability

Stablecoin card businesses themselves are showing observable growth.

In March 2026, Visa disclosed in an updated official article that stablecoin-linked cards processed approximately $5.2 billion in payments in 2025—an increase of 319% year-on-year—but still represented only about 0.04% of Visa’s global payment volume.[3]

This data reflects a representative market state: rapid growth, yet still in early penetration phase.

Later that year, in June, Visa revealed over 160 stablecoin-linked card projects globally were either live or in development.[4]

More projects entering the market indicate that the integration of stablecoins with existing card networks is no longer just a proof-of-concept. But the rise in project count also underscores the increasing importance of underlying infrastructure capabilities.

A single card enables enterprise users to make payments, but behind it lies the coordination of multiple complex processes: transaction authorization, fund allocation, clearing and settlement, ledger management, compliance, AML, and anti-fraud systems.

For enterprises wanting to launch their own branded cards, the hardest part is rarely designing a sign-up page—it’s ensuring the entire business remains available long-term across diverse markets, customer needs, and risk scenarios.

This is exactly what Du Jun keeps emphasizing.

When asked what defines a competitive global card issuance solution, he first highlighted “stable service,” then broke it down into clearing and settlement, ledger management, compliance, AML, anti-fraud, and communication capabilities with card networks.

He offered a concrete example: if a company already serves 100,000 users, and its underlying card service goes down, the impact won’t stay at the technical level—it will cascade directly through the enterprise’s business to end users.

For ToB payment companies, stability isn’t an abstract product feature—it’s a prerequisite for customer operations.

The larger the client base, the higher the demands for reconciliation, risk control, anomaly resolution, and service responsiveness. Therefore, as more stablecoin card projects emerge, market demand for mature infrastructure becomes even more evident.

Five: WasabiCard’s Moat Isn’t Just a Card—It’s Resource Orchestration and Service Delivery

If the stablecoin card business model has been validated, competitors will inevitably enter. So where does WasabiCard differentiate itself?

Du Jun’s answer centers on service capability, resource orchestration, and the team’s understanding of complex operations.

When discussing Rain, another player in the stablecoin card infrastructure space, Du Jun acknowledges similarities in business models. But when evaluating WasabiCard, he particularly values the team’s communication efficiency and responsiveness.

For enterprise clients, this isn’t an added bonus on the experience layer—it’s a core component of business continuity.

Cross-language communication, business confirmation, compliance requirements, payment anomalies, and customer complaints consume significant operational resources. Especially in cross-border scenarios, clients need quick access to service providers, clear problem identification, and swift resolution.

Therefore, service capability must evolve alongside system capability.

Smooth onboarding, sustained support during business growth, and timely response during incidents all shape enterprises’ long-term perception of a payment platform.

Du Jun also highlights WasabiCard’s strategy of collaborating with multiple BIN Sponsors—organizations providing card network access and related issuance support.

In his view, a richer pool of partner resources enables the platform to offer more flexible solutions and reduce dependency on any single channel. For clients operating in multiple markets, this resource orchestration capability holds practical significance.

Naturally, multi-channel access doesn’t automatically eliminate all downtime risks. Its real value lies in the platform’s ability to organize viable, sustainable service offerings across varying cooperation rules, applicable regions, and customer needs.

The more partnerships, the higher the management demands.

From an enterprise procurement standpoint, evaluating a card platform shouldn’t focus solely on the card products it offers, but on how it delivers consistently: are channels aligned with business needs? Is clearing and settlement transparent? Is risk control adequate? Can service keep pace with customer growth?

Fireblocks’ State of Stablecoins 2025 presents similar enterprise-grade requirements. This survey, conducted in March 2025 with 295 professionals from banks, payment institutions, and related sectors, found that 41% of respondents considered speed and 34% considered compliance as non-negotiable infrastructure requirements.[5]

This survey isn’t a product review of WasabiCard, but it provides crucial industry context for understanding Du Jun’s investment rationale: competition in enterprise payments has expanded into service quality, compliance, and operational capability.

What he values isn’t a replicable feature, but the foundation WasabiCard has already established across these dimensions.

Six: 500% Year-on-Year Transaction Growth—But More Important Is Capacity to Scale

"Running a financial business is different from running an internet or other kind of business."

When speaking about the team, Du Jun places strong emphasis on professional expertise.

He recalls multiple exchanges with the WasabiCard founding team prior to investment. Their background in traditional finance and card networks—over 10 years of global payment and card issuance experience—was a key reason he trusted the company.

For enterprise payments, such experience shouldn’t just reside on paper—it must manifest in resource orchestration and service delivery: understanding which channels suit client businesses, knowing how accounting and settlement interconnect, and proactively identifying and building necessary risk controls before business expansion.

Another trait Du Jun values is the team’s pragmatism and lack of recklessness.

In his description, WasabiCard has established a clear business model and sustains operations through continuous service delivery to clients.

New business metrics provide even more concrete validation.

Over three years, WasabiCard refined its global localization strategy—achieving 100% compliance across regions and acting as a practical implementer of local regulatory requirements. To date, WasabiCard has issued over 700,000 cards, with transaction volume growing nearly 500% year-on-year and 30% month-over-month. Cumulative transaction volume has reached $1 billion. Enterprise customer churn rate is nearly zero, and the platform serves over 700 enterprise clients.

The 500% YoY transaction growth and 30% MoM card issuance growth reflect progress at different levels.

For a ToB platform, these metrics matter beyond sheer scale.

Quarterly transaction volume reflects activity growth; enterprise client count and retention offer another lens into service sustainability. Clients don’t just need to onboard once—they must continue using the platform throughout their operations.

Whether payments run stably, whether issues are resolved promptly, and whether channels adapt to business expansion all directly affect the longevity of client relationships.

Therefore, assessing WasabiCard’s growth requires looking beyond transaction volume or card issuance counts—to evaluate its capacity to absorb and sustain growth.

WasabiCard integrates global card issuance and global fund distribution under a unified API, offering virtual cards, physical cards, white-label issuance, and bulk payment capabilities to enterprises.

For platforms already with users and business contexts, this means they can embed payment functionality tailored to their needs without independently managing every underlying component.

This is the crux of Du Jun’s investment logic: truly valuable infrastructure doesn’t just help clients connect once—it grows alongside them, continuously handling increasing business complexity.

Seven: The Value of Capital Is Helping Teams Execute Their Business

Regarding WasabiCard’s next steps, Du Jun did not center the discussion around fundraising or exit strategies.

"The core is simply solid business execution."

In his view, strong business performance gives enterprises greater capital flexibility. Funding brings resources, but cannot replace real demand or actual operations.

This is also why he sets boundaries on post-investment engagement.

"Help more, interfere less," Du Jun summarized the investor’s role.

He believes founding teams, operating on the front lines, better understand specific issues. Investors should respect team expertise, fulfill responsibilities in board and shareholder meetings, and swiftly coordinate resources and provide assistance when requested.

In the interview, he mentioned that after observing WasabiCard’s progress and engaging with the team, the investor’s post-investment team responded to new demands. On specific operations, his assessment remained direct: "This incremental growth is excellent, and the growth rate is outstanding."

From industry trends to ToB models, to team dynamics and post-investment collaboration, Du Jun’s assessment of WasabiCard consistently follows one thread:

Identify real demand, recognize platforms capable of meeting it, and help teams execute their business sustainably.

Whether stablecoin payments ultimately become mainstream depends not on how many cards exist in the market, but on whether they can integrate into real, ongoing enterprise fund flows.

A single cross-border settlement, a salary disbursement, an ad purchase, or a platform launching its own payment product—all are concrete pathways for stablecoin payments to enter real-world commerce.

As the industry narrative shifts from "who launched a card?" to "who can support more enterprise payment workloads?", the ToB payment infrastructure represented by WasabiCard becomes an increasingly unavoidable critical node in the stablecoin payment chain.

And that, precisely, is why Du Jun chose to invest in WasabiCard.

References

[1] Vernal Capital Acquisition Corp. SEC filing, Management Team section. Used to verify Du Jun’s experiences at Huobi, ChainUp, and investment ventures. View original

[2] Allium, State of Stablecoins and Payments: September 2026, September 15, 2026, public summary. Payment data is estimated, not card-specific. View original

[3] Visa, How stablecoin-linked cards are modernizing money movement, updated March 31, 2026. Payment volume and growth rates refer to relevant card business within Visa’s network. View original

[4] Visa, Visa Announces New AI, Stablecoin and Token Innovations to Power Intelligent, Programmable Commerce at Visa Payments Forum, June 10, 2026. “Over 160” includes live and developing projects. View original

[5] Fireblocks, State of Stablecoins 2025, May 2, 2025. Survey conducted in March 2025, sample size: 295 professionals from banks, payments, and related sectors. View original

[6] WasabiCard, WasabiCard Series Pre-A Round Funding Announcement, July 22, 2026. Previously published funding announcement. View original

[7] ESMA, ESMA_QA_2404, January 17, 2025. Confirms MiCA-related stablecoin rules became applicable on June 30, 2024. View original

[8] Stripe, Stripe completes Bridge acquisition, February 4, 2025. View original

[9] Visa, Visa and Bridge Partner to Make Stablecoins Accessible for Everyday Purchases, April 30, 2025. View original