BIS paper finds stablecoins no cure for cross-border payment costs, fintechs win on price

BIS Working Paper 1385 builds comparable all-in cost measures for three cross-border payment rails and tests the claim that stablecoins fix the system's frictions. For anyone shaping a payments strategy or a stablecoin business case, it is a sober data-based check: fintech operators have already compressed costs sharply, while stablecoin transfers still depend on exchanges, thin FX liquidity and fiat off-ramps.

• BIS Working Paper 1385 was published on 19 October 2026 and carries no binding force, representing the authors' views rather than the BIS.
• Retail bank wire FX markups range from approximately 2% to 4.7% even for highly liquid currencies, before explicit wire fees are added.
• For $10,000 transfers from the United States, median fintech costs across developed-market currency groups run around $40 to $60, though some destinations cost considerably more.
• Stablecoin transfers still depend on crypto exchange, conversion and fiat-withdrawal fees, and liquidity between US dollar stablecoins and non-US currencies is generally very thin.
• Any favourable stablecoin FX pricing into emerging markets reflects capital-control distortions rather than the underlying blockchain technology.

Executive summary

BIS Working Paper 1385, "Competing rails for crossborder payments: banks, fintechs, and stablecoins," was published on 19 October 2026 by Wenxin Du, Catherine Huang and David Scharfstein, running to 67 pages with a discussion by Tobias Adrian. The authors state…

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