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Anatomy of a Stablecoin:
Stablecoins are some of the most complex products in the crypto neobank space.
What sits behind a digital dollar is hard to follow. The reserves, the banks, the mint, the chains. The legal side is even harder: who can issue it, which rules apply, what changes from coin to coin. That's true whether you're building your own stablecoin or just deciding which one to use.
I built Anatomy of a Stablecoin to simplify it:
programmablemoney.net/stablecoins/
It lets you explode a stablecoin and see everything that happens in between. You can flip it, zoom in and follow $100 in and out.
Here's everything inside:
Learn: 12 questions, in the order people actually ask:
1. What is a stablecoin?
2. What is inside it?
3. What backs every token?
4. Where is the money actually held?
5. How are tokens created and destroyed?
6. Who checks your identity before a coin is made: KYC, AML and sanctions screening
7. What the token actually is: a smart contract that tracks balances and can mint, burn and freeze
8. How does money get in and out?
9. What keeps the price at $1?
10. What makes it legal in the US?
11. Who builds each piece?
12. How do real stablecoins compare?
The 7 layers of a stablecoin:
1. Compliance: KYC, AML monitoring, sanctions screening and the Travel Rule
2. Reserves: cash, T-bills under 93 days, overnight repos and government money funds
3. Custody: segregated accounts, and holders get first claim if the issuer fails
4. Mint and burn: a token is created when a dollar comes in and destroyed when it goes out
5. Smart contract: ERC-20, SPL, TRC-20, plus the freeze, pause and blocklist functions
6. Blockchains: Ethereum, Solana, Base, Tron, BNB Chain, the XRP Ledger, Polygon, Arbitrum, Stellar, TON, Avalanche and Citrea
7. The token: the balance you actually see in your app
Follow the money:
• Money in: Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, Venmo, Cash App, bank transfer and crypto
• Money out: bank payouts, push to card, P2P apps, card spend and crypto
• Watch $100 go through every step: fund, verify, reserve, mint, deliver, trade, redeem, pay out
16 real stablecoins:
1. XO Cash: Exodus's dollar, issued by MoonPay on M0, on Solana
2. ctUSD: the dollar for Bitcoin apps on Citrea, issued by MoonPay on M0
3. USDT: the biggest, about $182B, issued from El Salvador
4. USDC: Circle's coin, about $71B, the largest US regulated stablecoin
5. USDe: Ethena's synthetic dollar, backed mostly by stablecoins it lends out plus hedged bitcoin and ether
6. DAI: no company issues it; smart contracts create it and SKY holders govern it
7. USD1: World Liberty Financial's dollar, issued by BitGo, a federally chartered trust bank
8. USDG: Paxos's Global Dollar, where partners can get up to all of the reserve income
9. PYUSD: PayPal's dollar, issued by Paxos
10. RLUSD: Ripple's dollar, issued by a New York trust company Ripple owns
11. USDD: TRON's dollar, backed mostly by TRX
12. U: an offshore coin on BNB Chain that says it has no license
13. TUSD: one of the oldest, with most of its reserves caught up in a court fight
14. EURC: Circle's euro coin, about 60% of the euro stablecoin market
15. SoFiUSD: issued directly by a US national bank
16. Phantom CASH: issued by Bridge on Solana
For each one: issuer, license, reserves, reports, chains, supply, who can mint directly and whether holders earn yield
• Check the supply yourself: links to CoinMarketCap, DefiLlama and each issuer's reserve report
• Race up to 4 dollar coins side by side and watch the same $100 move through each one
Who builds it:
• MoonPay, Circle, Tether, Paxos, Anchorage, Bridge, M0, Ethena and Coinbase, plus the analytics, custody and liquidity players
• Click a company and the model lights up the layers it runs
• See which coins each one really issues.
4 approaches to launching a dollar token:
1. Become the issuer: Obtain the required authorizations and take responsibility for reserves, redemption and compliance. Most direct control; generally the heaviest operational burden.
2. Use an issuance partner: Providers such as MoonPay, Paxos, Anchorage, or Bridge offer branded stablecoin issuance. You manage the brand and customer experience; the issuer's responsibilities and regulatory permissions depend on the specific arrangement.
3. Build on shared infrastructure or an existing stablecoin: Use a platform like M0, potentially with an issuance partner. PYUSDx is an example: MoonPay issues PYUSDx against PYUSD at 1:1; Paxos issues the underlying PYUSD. This adds another issuer and redemption layer.
4. Create a synthetic dollar: Use collateral plus derivatives hedges to target a dollar value, as Ethena does with USDe. This is a different backing model. Ethena's staking product, sUSDe, accrues rewards; simply holding USDe does not.
The rules:
• The 8 GENIUS Act requirements, checked live as you change the design: licensed issuer, 1:1 eligible reserves, segregated reserves, monthly reports, redemption at $1, an AML program, sanctions and freeze controls, no yield to holders
• The 4 issuer routes: bank subsidiary, federal nonbank, state issuer under $10B, and offshore
• Drag the price off $1 and see how fast it comes back. Strong reserves snap back, weak ones don't
• Switch to an algorithmic coin and watch it break the way TerraUSD did in 2022
Build your own
• Pick how you issue (a platform like M0 or PYUSDx, a partner, or your own license), plus the reserves, controls, chains and how money gets in and out
• Score it against GENIUS in real time, out of 8
• Get a launch plan with a timeline: about 12 weeks on a platform, about 20 with an issuing partner
Two modes
1. Simple: one circle that shows where your money goes when you add money, spend with a card or withdraw
2. Pro: every layer, every rail, every rule
149 sources behind it, all linked on the page:
programmablemoney.net/resources
Spot something wrong, or have an idea to make it better? DM me here or on LinkedIn. All feedback helps.
⚠️ DISCLAIMER ⚠️ A personal project built from experience. Not legal, financial or investment advice. Not affiliated with any company named. Talk to licensed professionals before you build anything.
This is a collab with @0xmars_! Thank you for helping me with massive launch.
Stablecoins are some of the most complex products in the crypto neobank space.
What sits behind a digital dollar is hard to follow. The reserves, the banks, the mint, the chains. The legal side is even harder: who can issue it, which rules apply, what changes from coin to coin. That's true whether you're building your own stablecoin or just deciding which one to use.
I built Anatomy of a Stablecoin to simplify it:
programmablemoney.net/stablecoins/
It lets you explode a stablecoin and see everything that happens in between. You can flip it, zoom in and follow $100 in and out.
Here's everything inside:
Learn: 12 questions, in the order people actually ask:
1. What is a stablecoin?
2. What is inside it?
3. What backs every token?
4. Where is the money actually held?
5. How are tokens created and destroyed?
6. Who checks your identity before a coin is made: KYC, AML and sanctions screening
7. What the token actually is: a smart contract that tracks balances and can mint, burn and freeze
8. How does money get in and out?
9. What keeps the price at $1?
10. What makes it legal in the US?
11. Who builds each piece?
12. How do real stablecoins compare?
The 7 layers of a stablecoin:
1. Compliance: KYC, AML monitoring, sanctions screening and the Travel Rule
2. Reserves: cash, T-bills under 93 days, overnight repos and government money funds
3. Custody: segregated accounts, and holders get first claim if the issuer fails
4. Mint and burn: a token is created when a dollar comes in and destroyed when it goes out
5. Smart contract: ERC-20, SPL, TRC-20, plus the freeze, pause and blocklist functions
6. Blockchains: Ethereum, Solana, Base, Tron, BNB Chain, the XRP Ledger, Polygon, Arbitrum, Stellar, TON, Avalanche and Citrea
7. The token: the balance you actually see in your app
Follow the money:
• Money in: Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, Venmo, Cash App, bank transfer and crypto
• Money out: bank payouts, push to card, P2P apps, card spend and crypto
• Watch $100 go through every step: fund, verify, reserve, mint, deliver, trade, redeem, pay out
16 real stablecoins:
1. XO Cash: Exodus's dollar, issued by MoonPay on M0, on Solana
2. ctUSD: the dollar for Bitcoin apps on Citrea, issued by MoonPay on M0
3. USDT: the biggest, about $182B, issued from El Salvador
4. USDC: Circle's coin, about $71B, the largest US regulated stablecoin
5. USDe: Ethena's synthetic dollar, backed mostly by stablecoins it lends out plus hedged bitcoin and ether
6. DAI: no company issues it; smart contracts create it and SKY holders govern it
7. USD1: World Liberty Financial's dollar, issued by BitGo, a federally chartered trust bank
8. USDG: Paxos's Global Dollar, where partners can get up to all of the reserve income
9. PYUSD: PayPal's dollar, issued by Paxos
10. RLUSD: Ripple's dollar, issued by a New York trust company Ripple owns
11. USDD: TRON's dollar, backed mostly by TRX
12. U: an offshore coin on BNB Chain that says it has no license
13. TUSD: one of the oldest, with most of its reserves caught up in a court fight
14. EURC: Circle's euro coin, about 60% of the euro stablecoin market
15. SoFiUSD: issued directly by a US national bank
16. Phantom CASH: issued by Bridge on Solana
For each one: issuer, license, reserves, reports, chains, supply, who can mint directly and whether holders earn yield
• Check the supply yourself: links to CoinMarketCap, DefiLlama and each issuer's reserve report
• Race up to 4 dollar coins side by side and watch the same $100 move through each one
Who builds it:
• MoonPay, Circle, Tether, Paxos, Anchorage, Bridge, M0, Ethena and Coinbase, plus the analytics, custody and liquidity players
• Click a company and the model lights up the layers it runs
• See which coins each one really issues.
4 approaches to launching a dollar token:
1. Become the issuer: Obtain the required authorizations and take responsibility for reserves, redemption and compliance. Most direct control; generally the heaviest operational burden.
2. Use an issuance partner: Providers such as MoonPay, Paxos, Anchorage, or Bridge offer branded stablecoin issuance. You manage the brand and customer experience; the issuer's responsibilities and regulatory permissions depend on the specific arrangement.
3. Build on shared infrastructure or an existing stablecoin: Use a platform like M0, potentially with an issuance partner. PYUSDx is an example: MoonPay issues PYUSDx against PYUSD at 1:1; Paxos issues the underlying PYUSD. This adds another issuer and redemption layer.
4. Create a synthetic dollar: Use collateral plus derivatives hedges to target a dollar value, as Ethena does with USDe. This is a different backing model. Ethena's staking product, sUSDe, accrues rewards; simply holding USDe does not.
The rules:
• The 8 GENIUS Act requirements, checked live as you change the design: licensed issuer, 1:1 eligible reserves, segregated reserves, monthly reports, redemption at $1, an AML program, sanctions and freeze controls, no yield to holders
• The 4 issuer routes: bank subsidiary, federal nonbank, state issuer under $10B, and offshore
• Drag the price off $1 and see how fast it comes back. Strong reserves snap back, weak ones don't
• Switch to an algorithmic coin and watch it break the way TerraUSD did in 2022
Build your own
• Pick how you issue (a platform like M0 or PYUSDx, a partner, or your own license), plus the reserves, controls, chains and how money gets in and out
• Score it against GENIUS in real time, out of 8
• Get a launch plan with a timeline: about 12 weeks on a platform, about 20 with an issuing partner
Two modes
1. Simple: one circle that shows where your money goes when you add money, spend with a card or withdraw
2. Pro: every layer, every rail, every rule
149 sources behind it, all linked on the page:
programmablemoney.net/resources
Spot something wrong, or have an idea to make it better? DM me here or on LinkedIn. All feedback helps.
⚠️ DISCLAIMER ⚠️ A personal project built from experience. Not legal, financial or investment advice. Not affiliated with any company named. Talk to licensed professionals before you build anything.
This is a collab with @0xmars_! Thank you for helping me with massive launch.
2:35
One shotted this with Claude Opus 5.5.
Turns out building a crypto neobank is easy. Everyone can do it today.
How to build a neobank in 3 easy steps:
1. Choose your region: the US, Europe, Latin America or Asia
2. Choose your stablecoin: USDC, USDT, or USDC plus cash at the bank
3. Of course I didn't one shot this and spent way too much on tokens 🤣. And no, you can't build a neobank in 3 easy steps.
It's extremely hard, and it's quickly becoming a commodity. If you think you can build one because you know how to set up a wallet with Privy, you're in for a surprise.
Every choice changes what happens under the hood: the tech stack, the region, the goal, the stablecoin. Each one comes with its own rules and tradeoffs. Margins are thin. The moat is distribution.
So I built Programmable Money so you could brainstorm and actually understand how crypto neobanks work.
Hit Explode and the app comes apart in 3D, like an X ray. You see every layer hiding behind the screen. How money gets in and out, the stablecoin under your balance, the wallet and the chains it runs on, earn and borrow, tokenized assets and the card.
Click any piece and it tells you what it does, who runs it and which rules apply. Then press Play and follow $100 as it moves through the whole thing, step by step.
It's the easiest way I've found to dissect the tech and actually understand it.
Here's what you can play with:
Choose your region:
1. United States
2. Europe
3. Latin America
4. Asia
Choose your goal:
1. Remittances
2. Dollar savings
3. Freelancers paid from abroad
4. Travel spending
5. Crypto holders
6. Small businesses
Choose what backs the balance:
1. USDC
2. USDT
3. USDC and USDT
Choose your chains:
1. Solana
2. Ethereum
3. Base
4. Tron
5. Polygon
6. Arbitrum
7. OP Mainnet
8. TON
9. Plasma
10. BNB Chain
Choose who holds the coins:
1. A custody partner
2. The user, with a self custody account
Choose your license route:
1. Partner model
2. Your own state licenses
3. EU EMI or CASP
4. Offshore only
Money in:
1. US bank transfer
2. SEPA transfer
3. SPEI or PIX
4. Direct deposit
5. Card or Apple Pay
6. Crypto deposit
7. Exchange transfer
Money out:
1. Card spend
2. Bank payout
3. Local payout
4. Send to another user
5. Crypto withdrawal
6. Bill pay
7. Yield vault
Pass the rules:
1. Customers verified
2. Sanctions screening
3. Licensed to move money
4. Permitted stablecoin
5. Supervised custody
6. Customer funds kept apart
7. No interest on stablecoins
8. Fully backed and shown
Then get your launch plan. Free, no sign up:
1. Where you stand
2. Your setup
3. Your path
4. Who to talk to
5. Rules by market
5. Decisions still open
6. Rough timeline
Every fact linked to its source. 680 sources for this world alone.
If you're thinking about building one, this is the place to brainstorm first.
Anatomy of a Stablecoin Neobanks is live today. A new world drops every Friday: Stablecoins next, then cards, earn and borrow, tokenized assets, wallets and the full stack. I'll keep improving every one of them.
programmablemoney.net/stablecoin-neo…
Every source behind it, in one place:
programmablemoney.net/resources
Spot something wrong, or have an idea to make it better? DM me here or on LinkedIn. All feedback helps.
⚠️ DISCLAIMER ⚠️
A personal project built from experience. Not legal, financial or investment advice. Not affiliated with any company named. Talk to licensed professionals before you build anything.
Huge inspiration from the work of @konstantinsaifo and @DilumSanjayaView quoted post on X
