PayPal & Solana

Posted on | by Leon Hinde | Leave a Comment on PayPal & Solana

PayPal has chosen the Solana blockchain to expand its stablecoin, PayPal USD, marking its first move beyond the Ethereum ecosystem.

According to an announcement on May 28, PYUSD has been added to the Solana network, allowing users to perform transactions at a lower cost. The move seeks to expand the uses of PYUSD stablecoin as a payment method for small and daily purchases.

Solana processes up to 65,000 transactions per second at costs as low as $0.0025, significantly outpacing Ethereum’s 15 transactions per second with higher fees, which may vary from $1 to $50 during times of congestion. ​In other words, while a transaction on Ethereum could take a few minutes to process, the same transfer using Solana could be completed in less than a minute.

The Solana network surged as the most used blockchain for stablecoin transfers since last year. According to data from analytics platform Artemis, stablecoin transfer volume on Solana reached $1.5 trillion over the past year, largely surpassing Ethereum’s volume of $885 billion over the same period.

PayPal launched its stablecoin in August 2023 in collaboration with Paxos Trust Company. The stablecoin was initially issued only on Ethereum as an ERC-20 token and is backed by U.S. dollar deposits, short-term Treasurys, and cash equivalents.