Exclusive: Coinbase and Mastercard have both held advanced talks to buy stablecoin startup BVNK for around $2 billion

Almost one year after the fintech giant Stripe struck a $1.1 billion deal to acquire the stablecoin startup Bridge, two other big corporate players want to scoop up a stablecoin firm of their own. The U.S. crypto exchange Coinbase and the payments giant Mastercard have each held advanced acquisition talks to buy London-based BVNK, according to six sources familiar with the dealings, who asked for anonymity to talk about confidential business discussions. 

The terms and winning bidder haven’t been finalized, but the sale price is in the range of $1.5 billion to $2.5 billion, according to some of the sources. The talks may not result in a final deal, but at present Coinbase appears to have the inside track over Mastercard, three of the sources told Fortune.

If any deal is reached, it would be the largest stablecoin acquisition yet, and another signal that stablecoins, or cryptocurrencies pegged to underlying assets like the U.S. dollar, have reached the financial mainstream. And, if BVNK decides to sell itself to Mastercard, it’s the clearest sign yet that the incumbent payments network—whose shares fell in June on news that Amazon and Walmart were pursuing stablecoins—is taking the rise of the technology seriously.

BVNK, Mastercard, and Coinbase declined to comment. 

Stablecoin boom

Founded in 2021 by Chris Harmse, Jesse Hemson-Struthers, and Donald Jackson, BVNK helps companies use stablecoins for customer transactions, cross-border payments, global treasuries, and a slew of other use cases. BVNK raised $50 million in December in a round that valued the startup at around $750 million. Haun Ventures led the fundraise, with participation from Coinbase Ventures and existing investor Tiger Global. Other more recent investors include <a href="https://bvnk.com/blog/visa-invests-in-bvnk">Visa</a> and Citi’s venture arms. 

That round still valued BVNK less than Bridge, which was founded a year later by Coinbase and Square alumni and officially acquired by the payments giant Stripe in February. Still, in a previous interview with Fortune from last December, Hemson-Struthers described BVNK as the “global leader” in stablecoin infrastructure, citing its extensive banking relationships and financial licenses. While Bridge has since taken a more mainstream presence through its work with Stripe on new products like open issuance, which allow businesses to launch their own stablecoins, the acquisition of BVNK would likely eclipse last year’s landmark deal. 

Stablecoins have been a mainstay in crypto for more than a decade, but the tokens, designed to stay stable in price as opposed to more volatile cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum, have become one of the buzziest sectors in Silicon Valley over the past year. Proponents say that stablecoins are faster and cheaper than existing payment rails. Rather than wait for a wire to clear over days, users can send or receive the tokens in seconds and with minimal fees. Infrastructure startups like BVNK facilitate the movement between stablecoins and fiat, another term for state-backed currencies like the U.S. dollar. 

Since January, stablecoin startups have raked in hundreds of millions of dollars of venture funding, especially as investors have watched stablecoin giant Circle go public in a red-hot IPO in June and President Donald Trump sign the Genius Act in July, which is legislation that creates a bespoke regulatory framework for the crypto assets.

The rise of stablecoins have put incumbent financial giants like banks and payment network operators on the defensive. That includes Mastercard, whose share price tanked further in June after the Senate passed the Genius Act.

Still, Mastercard executives have downplayed the threat of stablecoins to their business. “I think most flows will begin and end in fiat,” Raj Seshadri, chief commercial payments officer at Mastercard, said in a July call with analysts. “And stablecoin[s] will just be one more currency for some specific use cases where it might have an application.”    

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com