Bank of Italy study finds stablecoins lack universal remittance edge

The mystery-shopping experiment, which involved moving 200 USDC between Italy and five nations—Argentina, Brazil, South Africa, the UAE, and Japan—highlighted a significant disparity in costs. While the blockchain leg of these transactions averaged a modest 0.4%, the peripheral expenses tied to funding methods, foreign exchange conversion, and withdrawal fees pushed the total cost to nearly 9% in some instances. Consequently, the authors concluded that stablecoins currently offer no systematic financial advantage over established providers.

Speed benchmarks further underscored the reliance on legacy systems. Transfers completed in under 20 minutes only when supported by instant payment rails like Italy’s TIPS, Brazil’s Pix, or Argentina’s Transferencias 3.0. Conversely, routes involving South Africa lagged, taking up to two business days due to standard banking delays at the fiat endpoints. These findings support Governor Fabio Panetta’s position that stablecoins are not a universal panacea for cross-border friction. Instead, the study suggests that the true bottleneck lies in fragmented domestic payment infrastructures and compliance requirements, which blockchain settlement alone cannot bypass.