Stripe, a financial services and payments processing company, is developing a new blockchain called “Tempo” in partnership with Paradigm, a cryptocurrency-focused venture capital firm. The project was revealed through a job posting that described Tempo as a high-performance, payments-focused blockchain currently in stealth mode. Sources indicate that Tempo is a layer 1 blockchain, meaning it is not built on top of other protocols and is compatible with the coding language used on the Ethereum blockchain.
Matt Huang, Paradigm’s managing partner and co-founder, also sits on the board of Stripe. The development of Tempo is part of Stripe’s strategy to delve deeper into the cryptocurrency sector. The company recently acquired a stablecoin infrastructure firm and a crypto wallet developer.
This initiative comes amid increasing interest in stablecoins, a form of cryptocurrency pegged to fiat assets like the U.S. dollar. Interest in stablecoins has surged recently, especially following regulatory developments aimed at creating clear rules around their use. A recent report noted that the growing stablecoin market might lead to decreased lending from traditional banks, opening opportunities for FinTech platforms to fill the void.
An economic bulletin also explored the impact of stablecoins on the U.S. Treasury market, noting that although the current stablecoin market is too small to significantly influence Treasury demand, it is expected to grow substantially in the coming years. Stripe has not commented publicly on the Tempo project. The development of this blockchain could potentially position Stripe at the forefront of payments-focused blockchain technology, further integrating cryptocurrency solutions into mainstream financial services.
Building blockchains is the newest trend in fintech. Online brokerages like Robinhood and eToro are also developing their own blockchains. The sudden flood of corporate blockchains prompts the question: Why are finance companies like Stripe becoming blockchain developers?
For Stripe, the answer is vertical integration. Through its acquisitions, Stripe has bought its own stablecoin, payments network, and crypto wallet. Adding a blockchain represents the creation of a comprehensive stablecoin ecosystem.
Stripe is betting that stablecoins could be the future of payments and aims to capture the revenue from transactions that might otherwise pass through traditional payment methods.
Stripe delves into blockchain payments
Blockchains function similarly to the Cloud or AWS in the crypto tech stack.
A decentralized fleet of servers processes many of the transactions on a crypto app, and the owners of these servers receive fees in return for lending their computing power. Circle, the stablecoin issuer, is also building its own blockchain to process payments and receive associated fees. However, Stripe and Circle aren’t on equal footing.
Stripe is one of the biggest private companies in tech, with a diversified revenue stream, while Circle derived more than 96% of its revenue in the second quarter of 2025 from the interest on U.S. Treasuries backing its stablecoin. Some analysts believe Circle is playing catch-up, being defensive and reactive, while Stripe is thinking about the future of payments and their business, being offensive and proactive. Stablecoins are set to surge following the passage of the GENIUS Act, and major issuers now aim to run their own layer 1 blockchains, not just build on others.
If they win, someone has to lose. The two largest stablecoins are Tether (USDT) and USD Coin (USDC), with respective market capitalizations of $164.85 billion and $65.22 billion. These issuers are now pushing to control the blockchain payments infrastructure.
Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire has stated that the current mix of blockchains is insufficient to meet the needs of a modern payments system. For new blockchains to succeed, they will need to take market share from existing players. Ethereum, with a market capitalization of $563.7 billion, is too slow and expensive for widespread payments use.
Its current average transaction fee is $1.05, and it can only handle about 20 transactions per second. Tron, launched by Chinese billionaire Justin Sun, is another dominant blockchain when it comes to USDT, hosting $81.89 billion of the asset. Tron has a reputation for being a low-cost blockchain, but its average transaction cost is $1.70, higher than Ethereum’s.
These limitations of existing blockchains create opportunities for stablechains like Arc to compete, particularly against Tron. Given the limitations of existing blockchains for payments, new stablechains may try to capture market share while competing with real industry incumbents like Visa. Circle’s strategy appears to be either to cooperate with or compete against Visa.
As stablecoins continue to grow and issuers push to control the infrastructure, the battle for dominance in blockchain payments is just beginning.