Banca d’Italia study finds USDC remittances lacked consistent cost edge in July 2026

Banca d’Italia said a July 2026 study found stablecoin remittances did not consistently outperform traditional transfer services on either cost or speed. Researchers sent 200 USDC across 10 corridors linking Italy with Argentina, Brazil, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates and Japan, and recorded total costs ranging from 0.30% to nearly 9%. The blockchain leg averaged 0.4%, but most costs came from exchange purchases, funding methods, withdrawals and foreign-exchange conversion, leading the authors to conclude there was “no systematic cost advantage” over traditional channels. Compared with Wise simulations for the same $200 amount, USDC was cheaper in three comparable routes and more expensive in four, underscoring that any savings were highly corridor-specific. Timing results also hinged on local banking infrastructure: routes using TIPS, Pix and Transferencias 3.0 settled in under 20 minutes, while South African corridors took one or two business days because fiat endpoints were slower. The study said stablecoin rails and domestic instant-payment systems worked as complements, not substitutes, and cautioned that its limited sample “cannot be readily generalized” across all providers or corridors.