Thunes and Circle: Stablecoin liquidity for real-time settlements
Businesses grow when they can fund, settle, and reconcile quickly.
Yet in cross-border payments, cash is often trapped in pre-funded accounts. Settlement cycles stretch across days, FX costs stack up, and treasury teams struggle to maintain visibility and control.
Stablecoins are changing that. With digital, fully reserved assets like USDC, businesses can move value instantly across time zones, currencies, and banking hours.
Through the Thunes and Circle partnership and stablecoin liquidity, companies can now move funds instantly and at any time, freeing up working capital and removing settlement friction.
Table of contents
The limits of legacy liquidity and settlement
Traditional liquidity management wasn’t built for a world that runs 24/7/365, and this causes issues for liquidity and settlement.
Capital locked in pre-funding
To ensure payouts happen smoothly, businesses often maintain local currency accounts across multiple corridors. These balances sit idle until needed, which ties up millions in working capital. The result is liquidity trapped across the network; efficient in theory, but expensive and inflexible in practice.
Delayed settlements
Cross-border payments still depend on banking hours, batch processing, and time zone alignment across different jurisdictions. That means out-of-hours payments, weekends and holidays can extend settlement windows from minutes to days.
Fragmented flows
Every corridor and currency in the payment chain introduces operational friction. Treasury teams juggle multiple banks, intermediaries, and FX conversions, making reconciliation and forecasting harder.
Compliance bottlenecks
Sanctions screening, AML checks, and reporting are frequently handled outside the core payment flow. Adding this external layer slows reviews and increases exceptions, especially at scale.
Legacy liquidity models weren’t built for digital businesses that move at Internet speed. The Thunes/Circle model is.
What the Thunes and Circle partnership delivers
Thunes and Circle are combining stablecoin infrastructure with global payout connectivity to unlock always-on liquidity and seamless settlements.
Thunes has been enabling stablecoin-powered liquidity for more than a year, with production-ready flows already active across key corridors. This isn’t a pilot or proof of concept: it’s a proven capability trusted by global payment providers and financial institutions.
| Capability | How it works | Business outcome |
| USDC funding into Thunes SmartX Treasury System | Fund once in USDC, maintain a single balance for global disbursements | Simplified treasury and reduced idle capital |
| Real-time access to liquidity | Fund 24/7, even on weekends or holidays | No cut-off risk, instant access to working capital |
| Payout locally | Convert on payout through Thunes Direct Global Network in 130+ countries | Real-time local settlement with FX transparency |
| Enterprise-grade on/off-ramps | Circle Accounts and APIs handle fiat ↔ USDC conversions | Seamless funding and redemption |
| Built-in trust and compliance | USDC is fully backed by cash and short-term treasuries; Thunes Fortress Compliance Platform manages KYC/AML | Regulatory-grade assurance and traceability |
USDC funding into Thunes SmartX Treasury System
Businesses can now fund their Thunes SmartX Treasury account directly in USDC, eliminating the need to maintain fragmented pre-funded balances in multiple corridors. A single, digital balance powers global payouts, reducing idle capital and improving cash visibility.
Real-time access to liquidity
Because USDC operates on blockchain rails, funding becomes instant and continuous. Combined with Thunes’ always-on SmartX infrastructure, businesses can deploy liquidity in real time – 24/7, including weekends and holidays – without waiting for bank cut-offs or settlement windows.
Convert on payout
Thunes’ “convert-on-payout” model allows funds to remain in USDC until the moment of disbursement. At that point, Thunes converts and settles locally through our Direct Global Network, which spans more than 130 countries and 550+ partners. This reduces FX risk and ensures recipients are paid in their preferred currency or payment method, such as digital wallets.
Enterprise-grade on/off-ramps
Circle’s APIs provide seamless fiat ↔ USDC conversion, enabling enterprises to fund from their existing bank accounts or redeem back into fiat whenever needed. This flexibility makes it easy for regulated institutions and PSPs to adopt stablecoin liquidity without overhauling their current treasury processes.
Built-in trust and compliance
With live stablecoin corridors already operating for over a year, Thunes combines experience with regulatory-grade safeguards, giving enterprises confidence to scale without risk. Our Fortress Compliance Platform layers on robust KYC, AML, and transaction monitoring across all flows. Together with Circle’s USDC, which is fully reserved, they deliver a compliant, auditable liquidity environment that meets enterprise and regulatory expectations.
What are the benefits of stablecoin liquidity?
The partnership between Thunes and Circle reshapes how businesses can manage liquidity, risk, and scale.
It turns stablecoin-powered funding into a practical advantage for global operations.
Faster settlements
Whether disbursing to merchants, partners, or gig workers, payouts can happen the same day, even across time zones. This speed helps platforms release funds sooner, improve partner satisfaction, and unlock new business models that rely on instant settlement. With always-available liquidity, cash flow becomes a growth driver, not a constraint.
Treasury efficiency
A single-balance model within Thunes SmartX means no more managing multiple pre-funded accounts. Treasury teams gain real-time visibility into available balances, can reconcile faster, and reduce the operational burden of maintaining fragmented accounts across currencies and geographies. The result is leaner working capital and greater control over liquidity deployment.
Operational resilience
Access to always-on liquidity removes dependence on banking hours and reduces payout backlogs. This resilience is critical during peak demand or periods of market volatility, when traditional rails may slow down.
With Thunes and Circle, businesses can sustain uninterrupted operations and meet obligations in real time, strengthening trust and reliability across partners and recipients.
Smarter FX handling
With Thunes’ “convert-on-payout” model, businesses can hold value in USDC and convert only when executing local payouts. This just-in-time conversion approach reduces FX risk and premature currency exchanges and allows treasury teams to optimize timing based on rates and liquidity needs.
Compliance confidence
Thunes’ Fortress Compliance Platform and Circle’s fully backed USDC reserves give businesses confidence that every transaction is secure, traceable, and compliant. Combined, they bring the same trust and oversight expected from traditional finance to stablecoin liquidity, without sacrificing speed.
Example flows for business operations
The benefits of stablecoin liquidity extend across many use cases, from merchant payouts to gig worker disbursements and treasury operations, where speed, visibility, and efficiency are critical.
Merchant payouts
An e-commerce platform can fund its SmartX Treasury Account in USDC. When merchants request withdrawals, Thunes executes same-day payouts to their local bank accounts or mobile wallets. The platform keeps liquidity centralized, without maintaining local pre-funding.
Outcome: Instant settlement, lower FX costs, and reduced working capital requirements.
Gig and marketplace disbursements
Global gig platforms disburses thousands of small payments daily. With Thunes and Circle, liquidity is deployed “just in time,” meaning USDC is only converted and settled locally when payouts are triggered.
Outcome: High-volume, low-value payouts delivered instantly, with no batch delays or bank cut-offs.
Treasury top-ups
A fintech or payment service provider (PSP) can instantly top up its Thunes account in USDC to meet unexpected spikes in payout demand, such as peak holiday periods or partner promotions.
Outcome: Elastic liquidity that scales with demand, without idle capital or slow bank transfers.
From idle capital to instant liquidity
We view the future as hybrid, where fiat, stablecoins, and even CBDCs coexist. Our role is to connect these rails, enabling businesses to move money on the path that best fits their needs.
Thunes is uniquely positioned to operationalize stablecoin liquidity at scale. Our Direct Global Network connects banks, digital wallets, and alternative payment methods in over 130 countries. That means stablecoin liquidity can move beyond crypto-native platforms, reaching end beneficiaries in local currency, instantly and compliantly.
By combining Circle’s USDC infrastructure with Thunes’ global payout network and SmartX Treasury System, businesses, platforms and marketplaces can transform how they fund and settle worldwide operations.
- Real-time funding and global payouts
- Reduced capital lockup and lower FX costs
- Compliance and transparency built in
Thunes and Circle turn stablecoin liquidity into a growth lever, replacing idle capital with instant settlement power.
Contact us for more information, and learn how Thunes can power your stablecoin liquidity.
