Cross-border innovation is a key part of the continued growth in the global payments industry.
Stablecoins notched over $10 trillion in transaction volume in January, and that's more than Visa and Mastercard do in a normal month combined.
And digital payments transaction values are expected to be close to $27 trillion this year.
Payments platforms are also rushing into AI, and they're using the technology to increase efficiency.
As well as security and personalization.
Well joining me live at the New York Stock Exchange this morning is John Caplan, CEO and Director of Pioneer.
John, great to have you here.
Thank you so much for joining me.
It's great to be here.
Q1 2026 here we are.
So tell us your take on where we are when it comes to the global payments infrastructure.
I think we're in a really exciting moment because you know regulatory frameworks have been in place for decades.
To allow global cross border trade to happen in a compliant way, and what we see at Pioneer is by adopting stablecoin infrastructure, which we've begun to do.
We have our first customers live using the Pioneer multi-currency wallet to send and receive stablecoins.
We're able to do that in a global trusted way.
And so I believe the pivot that's happening is from really a tradable asset to an asset that's Being used a utility that's being used and that moment is the most exciting moment in payments infrastructure since I've been a pioneer and two areas that I do want to ask you about that is regulation as well as stablecoins.
So there are still a lot of expectations regarding regulation here in the US and we know that legislation does take time, but what are you anticipating in 2026 when it comes to the US and what's happening?
Outside of US borders, you know, I think what the US has done, and I think it's very powerful, is set the tone that there will be a modern regulatory framework with the Genius Act that enables companies like ours to really drive stablecoin innovation here from the United States, but actually for it to impact global trade.
We applied just last Monday to the OCC for a stablecoin bank.
Our stablecoin bank charter plus should we be approved, will enable us to really push this innovation across cross-border B2B payments.
We are a billion dollars revenue business with $400 million of cash on our balance sheet, really solid growth, doing business in 190 countries and territories, whether it's a business process outsourcer in the Philippines, a Ukrainian grain exporter.
I don't know, a company in Vietnam.
We're helping those businesses participate in cross-border trade and we'll be able to push stablecoin innovation into emerging markets where it's, I think, sorely needed.
Yes, and for viewers who may not be as familiar with the stablecoin space and in particular innovation, what can they actually expect here?
I think they can see, frankly, more speed.
And more trust and reliability when you regulated deep investments in compliance around the world.
Companies like Pioneer, when we adopt this infrastructure into our platforms, we can drive the commercialization of the technology.
And of course I have to ask you about artificial intelligence because we know that everyone is paying attention to it from both an investment theme as well as an application in terms of industries.
So what is going on when it comes to artificial intelligence? your work it's an extraordinary moment because we're seeing 2 and 3x the productivity and speed from our engineering organization.
We're building agents inside the company to help our talented people get more done, take the parts of their job that suck.
Frankly, everybody has something in their job that they don't like to do.
Use an agent to do that.
We're a firm that believes we've hired really great people.
They're incredibly talented.
Let's use the technology to supercharge. are great people and that's what we're doing.
Yes, and finally, while I have you here, I do want to ask you about your partnership with Bridge.
So tell us what's going on.
Yes, we Bridge is a company that Stripe bought that is a stablecoin infrastructure provider.
We lit them up in our platform very quickly and we're grateful to the Bridge team.
They have excellent tech, enable us to learn, iterate, and expand our stablecoin offering really quickly.
So we're thrilled to work with Bridge and Stripe on that.
And finally, before I let you go, we are only In Q1 of 2026.
So what is your outlook when it comes to the rest of the year?
You know, it's interesting.
I was listening to Treasury Secretary Bennett this morning talk about seeing through the sort of shock of the last 72 hours into what a safer world could be for the global economy, and I'm hopeful and I'm going to stay optimistic that peace will break out.
Well, it was great having you here today.
Thank you so much for joining us and thank you so much for sharing your perspective and your insights.
Thank you.
Thank you.
