While the crypto market is still mired in discussions of a "winter," Stripe, in 2025, has pulled Web3 technology out of the "speculative narrative" and firmly planted it into the soil of the real economy, creating a different kind of "vitality."
On February 24th, Stripe released its 2025 annual letter, presenting a hardcore report card of "$1.9 trillion in total processed payment volume, a 34% year-over-year growth." More importantly, this letter contains the progress of its布局 after acquiring Web3 companies like Bridge and Privy—this was never just a simple capital并购, but a silent revolution: making Web3 no longer a niche player's狂欢, but becoming the underlying infrastructure for global payments and commerce in the AI era, quietly rewriting the rules of the global financial game.
First, the "Core Business": $1.9 Trillion, Facilitating 1.6% of Global GDP Flow
To understand Stripe's Web3 ambitions, one must first see its "confidence"—the core data in this annual letter, each point highlighting its absolute authority in the global payments领域 and solidifying the foundation for its Web3布局.
In 2025, the total value of transactions processed through the Stripe platform for all merchants and businesses using its services reached $1.9 trillion, a sharp increase of 34% year-over-year. How staggering is this number? Converted, it's equivalent to 1.6% of global GDP—meaning for every $100 of economic output created globally, $1.6 flows through Stripe's system. It's like an invisible financial artery, running through all aspects of the global real economy.
More crucially, Stripe's penetration has long surpassed the boundaries of a "payment tool." Its programmable financial services directly or indirectly empower over 5 million businesses worldwide, covering the vast majority of top AI companies, 90% of Dow Jones component companies, and 80% of Nasdaq 100 companies—almost encompassing the world's most dynamic commercial and tech entities.
Even in the startup领域, Stripe is quietly "monopolizing" the entry point: now, 25% of newly registered companies in Delaware, USA, are born through Stripe Atlas (its quick company setup service), meaning 1 out of every 4 new companies is tied to Stripe's ecosystem from the start. Additionally, its online payment tool Link has surpassed 200 million users, becoming one of the world's most popular quick payment methods.
This stable and robust core business gives Stripe enough confidence to bet on Web3—while most companies are收缩 their crypto布局 in the winter, it反而 increases investment, and the落地 progress of Bridge and Privy is the core answer sheet for this bet.
Breaking Prejudice: Even in the Crypto Winter, It's Still the Summer of Stablecoins
Mention stablecoins, and many people's first reaction is still "a safe haven for crypto speculation" or "an accessory to the crypto circle." But Stripe, in its annual letter, uses a set of data to狠狠 break this prejudice: "It might be a crypto winter now, but this is absolutely the summer of stablecoins."
The most直观 comparison is this:尽管 the current Bitcoin price has halved since October 2025 and the crypto market is低迷, stablecoin payment volume has逆势 doubled, reaching $400 billion in 2025. More notably, 60% of this $400 billion comes from B2B payments—this means stablecoins have jumped out of the "speculative tool" category and become a necessity for enterprise cross-border settlement and capital flow, truly entering the core scenarios of the real economy.
Behind all this, Bridge, acquired by Stripe for $1.1 billion, is the key driver. Many wonder, how is Bridge doing after the acquisition? The answer lies in its transaction volume—after being acquired, Bridge's transaction volume directly achieved over a fourfold growth, proving with strength Stripe's acquisition logic: not buying a company, but integrating a set of actionable technical capabilities.
Bridge: Transaction Volume Directly Achieves Over Fourfold Growth
Stripe's transformation of Bridge was never as simple as "changing owners"; it deeply integrated it into its own financial system, building a complete solution for fiat and cryptocurrency interoperability, achieving three key breakthroughs, each directly addressing industry pain points.
First, becoming the "technical core" of Stripe's stablecoin financial accounts. Now, Stripe's enterprise users can freely send and receive funds between fiat and cryptocurrency through the technical support provided by Bridge without needing additional third-party tools—no more facing cumbersome API integrations, no more worrying about compliance risks,相当于 opening a "convenient door" to crypto payments for businesses.
Second, breaking down the壁垒 between fiat and crypto. In April 2025, Bridge partnered with Visa to launch a stablecoin payment card: users can directly spend their stablecoin balance; during payment, the system automatically converts the stablecoin to local fiat currency; and the merchant side doesn't need to接触 any crypto technology or understand the underlying logic of stablecoins—the entire process is no different from ordinary card payments. This model彻底解决了 the biggest obstacle to stablecoins落地 in daily consumption.
The crypto wallet Phantom has also launched a stablecoin card for its users through Bridge, meaning stablecoins are no longer just "numbers in a wallet" but "real currency" that can be directly used to buy coffee, shop, truly entering ordinary people's lives.
Third, lowering the barrier to stablecoin issuance. Bridge's newly launched Open Issuance function allows any enterprise to quickly issue and manage its own stablecoins—without investing huge costs in R&D or spending significant time on compliance. Leveraging Stripe's ecosystem and Bridge's technology, they can have their own stablecoins, also providing new possibilities for SMEs' cross-border financing and capital management.
Privy and the "Disappearing Wallet": 110 Million Users' Painless Entry
If Bridge is the "circulation hub" for stablecoins, then Privy is the core piece of the puzzle for Stripe to打通 the Web3 wallet layer.
Privy is not limited to the定位 of an "exclusive wallet for crypto players"; it has been transformed into a tool that enterprises can directly reuse,彻底 lowering the barrier to using Web3.
Privy's core advantage is its powerful API capability—enterprises只需接入 the Privy API to quickly deploy user-friendly Web3 wallets for their users, without needing to develop interfaces adapted to different wallets separately or invest大量 manpower in researching crypto technology. This seemingly simple step彻底改变了 the application logic of Web3 wallets: they are no longer "niche toys" only for crypto enthusiasts; enterprises can also easily integrate them.
As of the end of 2025, Privy already supports over 110 million programmable wallets. These wallets are spread across the globe, serving various enterprises and users. In Stripe's view, Privy's core value is making Web3 infrastructure "平民化" (democratized).
Payment-Focused L1 Tempo即将上线 Mainnet
If Bridge and Privy are acquired puzzle pieces, then Tempo is Stripe's "亲儿子" (own son) jointly incubated with crypto VC Paradigm.
In its annual letter, Stripe毫不客气地 pointed out the defects of existing blockchains in payment scenarios, such as throughput, reliability, cost predictability, and privacy. A more serious problem is that Stripe believes as AI Agents begin to initiate transactions on a large scale, the future will require blockchains capable of processing millions or even billions of transactions per second. Existing blockchain architectures simply cannot meet this demand.
Tempo's design philosophy is simple: built specifically for payments. Its core capabilities include: dedicated payment channels, sub-second confirmation, optional privacy, paying fees in stablecoins, etc. Stripe stated that companies like Visa, Nubank, and Shopify are already testing Tempo's performance in various application scenarios, including global payments, embedded finance, and remittances. The Tempo mainnet is also即将上线.
The most戏剧性的 story comes from Klarna. The CEO of this company was a well-known crypto skeptic, publicly stating his disinterest in crypto technology. But after experiencing Tempo, his attitude did a 180-degree turn, and Klarna became the first bank to issue a stablecoin on the Tempo testnet.
The Future is Here: The Rise of Agentic Commerce
Even more exciting is the rise of "Agentic Commerce." Stripe predicts that future internet transactions will be primarily completed by AI Agents. We have far surpassed the mere hype phase and entered the phase of building and practical application.
· Stripe and OpenAI developed the Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP), and both also provided support for the first shopping experience built into ChatGPT.
· Launched Shared Payment Tokens, allowing agents to initiate payments without exposing credentials.
· Even launched Machine Payments, where developers can charge agents directly with just a few lines of code. Stripe will support payments using the USDC stablecoin on the Base chain via the x402 protocol, with plans to expand更多 protocols, payment methods, currencies, and blockchains in the future.
Stripe also特别强调 that Tempo's architecture is naturally suited for Agentic Commerce and micro-payments in the AI era, which is also the core direction of Stripe's布局. When countless AI Agents autonomously collaborate, purchase services, and exchange data on the internet, they will need a high-throughput, low-cost, programmable settlement layer.
Stripe Acquiring PayPal? A High-Stakes Bet Yet to Be Determined
On the same day Stripe released its annual letter, Bloomberg reported: Stripe is considering acquiring all or part of PayPal's business.
The timing is微妙. PayPal is in trouble: in 2025, it lost nearly a third of its market value全年, with a current market cap of about $43.5 billion. Meanwhile, according to CNBC, Stripe announced a tender offer to employees and shareholders, valuing the company at $159 billion, a 74% surge from $91.5 billion a year ago. Stripe co-founder and president John Collison told CNBC the company currently has no plans for an IPO, as it would distract from current product and business growth.
If the deal goes through, for Stripe, it would gain Venmo, a highly engaged consumer wallet, PayPal's enterprise merchant relationships, and brand checkout capabilities (尽管 growth has slowed recently). More importantly, it would significantly enhance Stripe's influence on the consumer side—Stripe has always been the king on the merchant side but relatively weak in the consumer wallet领域. However, despite the strategic vision, the practical difficulties of the transaction cannot be underestimated, such as antitrust regulation, funding, and integration.
Stripe president John Collison's response in an interview was interesting: "PayPal has obviously had a tough few years; the entire landscape has changed a lot with Apple Pay and Google Pay, etc. I can't talk about any M&A hypotheses, but they are indeed in a difficult position." This response is clever:既不 denying acquisition interest nor confirming negotiations, but acknowledging PayPal's困境 and changes in the market landscape.
Summary
To summarize, Stripe's 2025 narrative is clear: use stablecoins to break the geographical boundaries of finance, use Privy to lower the barrier to entry for Crypto, use Tempo to handle the trillions of transactions from future AI Agents, and use agentic commerce to connect AI and business.
Bridge's fourfold growth, Privy's hundred-million-level wallets, Tempo's testnet落地, and the penetration of stablecoins in the B2B领域 are all silently reshaping the infrastructure of the global economy.
We might see the birth of a truly "internet-native financial system." By then, you might find that the AI帮你买东西 (AI helping you buy things) uses stablecoins;跨国付款 (cross-border payments) go through a certain blockchain; your wallet isn't a bank app but a programmable account embedded in various applications. This isn't science fiction; it's the future Stripe is building.
As the letter says, the machine of优胜劣汰 (survival of the fittest) is accelerating. Stripe clearly doesn't want to be just a spectator of this machine but wants to be the engine that powers it.
