Why Arbitrum Is Betting on USDG: A New Way to Earn From Stablecoins

Roughly $3.8 billion in stablecoins sit on Arbitrum, and about 60% of that is Circle’s USDC, per DefiLlama. The network sees no direct share of the interest those reserves generate. Joining the Paxos-led Global Dollar consortium changes that. The group, which counts over 150 partners such as Robinhood, Kraken, Mastercard and OKX, hands part of the earnings from USDG reserves to the firms that help the token spread. Paxos issues USDG against one-for-one dollar backing, and more than $3 billion is already circulating. Brendan Ma of the Arbitrum Foundation said the ecosystem now holds a stake in the token’s growth.

USDG Rollout and DAO Proposal

USDG went live on Arbitrum Tuesday through Fluid, Morpho, GMX, Maple, Li.Fi, Gauntlet, Steakhouse, LayerZero and Kraken, which provides fiat on- and off-ramps. Uniswap and Fhenix will join later. A new proposal asks ArbitrumDAO to treat USDG adoption as a priority, commit 100 million ARB to the DRIP incentive program and use treasury funds to deepen liquidity.

Stablecoin Consortiums Race for Market Share

Competition is growing. OpenUSD, backed by Mastercard, Visa, Stripe, Coinbase and Shopify, is taking shape under Open Standard, and 37 banks stand behind Europe’s Qivalis. Arbitrum also powers Robinhood Chain, where Robinhood plans to share some user-activity revenue with the ecosystem.