Interchange is a regressive tax. Blockchain can – and should – kill it. When you swipe your debit or credit card, the interchange network – issuing processor, issuing bank, Visa/MC, merchant acquirer and merchant bank – all take a cut of the transaction by charging the merchant. Your points from your card were financed by the merchant and actually paid for by you through higher prices (think about how you can buy gas cheaper with cash). Wealthy consumers who earn outsized points (think Chase Saphire rewards) are subsidized by poorer consumers who earn no points. The big fintech payment companies like Stripe and Square are just lipstick on the interchange pig. Their whole value prop is improving the access to the interchange network, not making it cheaper through disintermediation. Fiserv’s FIUSD is perpetuating the same model – the recent announcement of partnering with Mastercard is demonstrative that all the same parties are still part of the flow, taking the same fees. FIUSD’s primary value is displacing ACH as a settlement platform for cash. That has value, but it’s missing the bigger opportunity and is competitive to solutions today (e.g., FedNow). Stablecoin can kill interchange. Blockchain supports bilateral transactions between buyer and seller. The Genius Act will bring a plethora of stablecoin issuers to market. They will begin to disintermediate the interchange players, but not all the way. I think JP Morgan, for example, will build a payment network that keeps issuing banks (Chase) but cuts out Visa and Mastercard. This is a golden opportunity for entrepreneurs. Build new bilateral payment rails using stablecoin that don’t harm merchants and lower income consumers. The lift is point-of-sale (thing QR code instead of Fiserv) and integration to merchant ERP/accounting systems (think partnering with SAP, Oracle, Microsoft, etc.). I’m looking forward to seeing – and participating through Figure – the disruption here.