Hyundai Card’s live $20,000 USDT transfer tests corporate treasury use of stablecoins

Hyundai Card has completed a live intercompany settlement between two of Hyundai Motor’s overseas units using Tether’s USDT stablecoin on the Avalanche blockchain, moving away from a laboratory test towards a genuine test of corporate treasury infrastructure. According to a Hyundai Card press release, the card issuer converted $20,000 from Hyundai Motor America into USDT, transferred the funds on-chain, and had them converted back into dollars at Hyundai’s Mexico unit — with the entire process completed in roughly seven minutes.

The company said this compares with the three to four hours typically required for a conventional interbank transfer of the same kind. Crucially, Hyundai Card stressed that the transaction supported an actual settlement need between the two entities rather than a theoretical demonstration, a distinction that matters for regulators assessing whether stablecoin rails are ready to carry real corporate cash flows rather than remain confined to pilot environments.

Compliance groundwork behind the transfer

Hyundai Card said it was responsible for the regulatory reviews, legal and tax assessments, internal control checks and overall remittance design underpinning the pilot, work that typically sits at the centre of any bank’s due diligence before it will clear a cross-border payment. Blockchain payments firm Axiym also took part in the test, providing the operational plumbing linking the fiat and stablecoin legs of the transaction.

“What makes this particularly meaningful is that the PoC was conducted in connection with actual intercompany settlement needs between Hyundai Motor’s overseas entities, not as a theoretical blockchain experiment,” a Hyundai Card spokesperson said.

That framing positions the exercise less as a technology showcase and more as an early test of whether a large industrial conglomerate is prepared to route real treasury flows through a public blockchain and a dollar-pegged stablecoin, a step with implications for how banks and payment networks price and structure their own correspondent services.

Visa and Circle to join European leg

Hyundai Card said it will launch a second proof-of-concept later this month involving Hyundai Motor’s European entities, this time bringing in Visa and USDC issuer Circle. Unlike the US-Mexico test, which relied solely on dollars, the European trial will examine stablecoin remittances across multiple local currencies and assess whether the model can meaningfully cut the cost of international settlement.

The involvement of Visa and Circle brings two heavily regulated payments and stablecoin players into a jurisdiction now operating under the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation, raising the stakes for how such a pilot is structured and disclosed to supervisors.

Read more: Hyundai Card’s stablecoin remittance trial heads to Europe, testing MiCA-era rails

Part of a wider institutional shift

The trial adds to a growing list of corporates and payment providers testing stablecoins for cross-border transfers. Last month, SBI Remit partnered with Fasset to build stablecoin infrastructure for remittances, treasury management and settlement, arguing that blockchain-based transfers could shorten settlement times and cut transaction costs.

Separately, MassPay integrated Coinbase’s USDC payment infrastructure into its global payout network spanning 180 countries in June. Proponents of these arrangements argue that stablecoin funding could remove the need for businesses to prefund accounts in multiple markets, freeing up capital while settlement takes place on-chain — a proposition that regulators in Brussels, London and elsewhere are watching closely as they weigh how existing payments and e-money rules should apply to corporate-scale stablecoin flows.