Ethereum is losing ownership of crypto payments as Base moves $565B in stablecoins

Stablecoin activity is becoming a contest over which blockchains move the most tokenized dollars.

Visa Onchain Analytics showed that the adjusted stablecoin transaction volume reached about $1.79 trillion in June, surpassing its February high and rising sharply from May. The key network split was tight: Base ranked first at about $565 billion in adjusted volume, just ahead of Ethereum at roughly $562 billion.

While the edge Base might have over Ethereum might be small, it's still a significant achievement. Base is a layer-2 network built around cheaper, faster Ethereum activity. When it rises to the top of an adjusted stablecoin flow table, it shifts attention from token supply to payment distribution: wallets, fees, app integrations, and settlement availability.

Visa's dashboard separates adjusted and unadjusted activity because raw blockchain volume can include bots, high-frequency wallets, internal smart contract movement, and intra-exchange transfers. Its adjusted methodology, developed with Allium and other partners, tries to strip out that noise and get closer to activity that looks and feels like real settlement.

The filters are still a best-guess approach, and Visa says it will keep improving its methodology as labeling coverage expands. Even with that limitation, adjusted volume is more useful for the Base-Ethereum comparison than raw transfer volume alone, as it shows where meaningful stablecoin movement is happening.

The issuer split reinforced USDC’s role in stablecoin settlement. USDC accounted for roughly 67% of June's adjusted volume, while USDT accounted for about 32%. That keeps USDC at the center of stablecoin flows, particularly on Base, but the more important shift remains how volume is distributed across networks.

Visa's broader stablecoin explainer describes stablecoins as payment infrastructure for cross-border transfers, stablecoin-linked cards, corporate payouts, and seven-day settlement. In that world, the chain that carries the dollars becomes the essential part of the product. Fees, wallet distribution, app integrations, and settlement availability all shape whether stablecoins feel usable outside trading venues.

Visa's insights page had already pointed to a much longer L2 trend, noting that L2 networks collectively surpassed Ethereum in monthly stablecoin transaction count in August 2024 and that Base saw rapid USDC growth after launching in 2023. June’s volume data shows that the same pattern is beginning to appear in adjusted dollar flows.

However, the lead remains narrow. Base topped Ethereum by only about $3 billion, with both networks clearing more than half a trillion dollars in adjusted volume. The next signal is whether L2s continue to capture payment-like stablecoin activity across multiple months and market conditions.

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