Speaking of moving money across borders — what if you could hold one balance and use it anywhere in the world instantly, without a bank? Joining me now in the studio is Ankitt Gaur, founder and CEO of OrbitX Pay and MFTA member. Ankitt, welcome to Wall Street to Mena. As geopolitical tensions ripple through markets, do you think that will actually accelerate demand for what you're building?
Absolutely. In these kinds of scenarios, when people have to move or evacuate, they often have to leave their wealth behind. Many people want to keep that wealth in self-custody so they can travel and access it when they arrive somewhere new. For the relocation use case specifically, this kind of technology is genuinely helpful.
You started with a simple idea — a stablecoin card. Now you're in over 140 countries. What happened?
People woke up to it. It's not just us operating in those countries directly — we've partnered with regulated partners across multiple countries who have helped bring the whole network together. Depending on where someone is based, we provide them with the payment instruments to hold their wealth and spend it on a Visa card wherever Visa is accepted.
OrbitX lets someone hold one balance and spend it anywhere. How does that actually work?
To be precise — anywhere Visa is accepted. We issue a Visa card so people can hold a balance in dollar-denominated stablecoins. Our technology is built to accommodate more stablecoins as they come. So for example, when the UAE's dirham stablecoin arrives, it can be used on the same rails. The technology is agnostic — people fund their accounts and spend on a Visa card. Right now it's one model, but the whole technology is built to be adopted in any scenario.
Is it going to expand to more models?
Yes. The same technology can be applied to regional stablecoins. Brazil has launched a stablecoin, the UAE has launched theirs. The same infrastructure could be adopted by a bank like Emirates NBD to run their stablecoin alongside the Visa cards they already have.
You offer AED accounts alongside USD, Euro, and GBP. Why is the UAE specifically important here?
A lot of our business clients are from outside the UAE — mainly trading companies. Sometimes they need to make or collect payments locally here. Having a UAE account alongside a dollar account and a GBP account makes that much easier. And vice versa — clients here who need to receive USD or pound payments, we offer them that too.
You recently spoke at How Hub Dubai on stablecoins for payments. Are businesses in this region actually ready to settle invoices with stablecoins?
We're somewhere in the middle right now. Many forward-looking businesses are already settling in stablecoins and are keen to do more. But some more conservative businesses are waiting for regulated stablecoins — like an AED stablecoin — to come into force before they fully commit. Once that happens, they're ready to move fast.
Is the infrastructure already there to start using stablecoins at scale?
Absolutely.
You've had four startup exits in nine years in Web3. What has all of that taught you?
I've personally been bullish on stablecoins since 2018 — I was writing articles back then saying stablecoins were the ultimate use case blockchain could achieve. But it was very early, so we built other projects in the meantime. In 2023 I met someone in the US — a Nigerian importer — who was talking about stablecoins with no connection to the crypto industry whatsoever. That was the eye-opener. That's when we decided to go all in on stablecoins.
So stablecoins were always the end goal?
You could say that. But what makes stablecoins powerful today is that anyone can understand them. You don't need to understand the technology. You send money, the other person receives it. That's it. That's what stablecoins do.
Traditional banks and payment rails aren't going away overnight, and everyone is going digital. Where does OrbitX sit alongside banks rather than against them?
We're a facilitator to banks. If a bank wants to run stablecoin rails, they work with us. We have the infrastructure to help them adopt stablecoins into their business offering. We work with banks, enabling them with the technology and knowhow, and bringing in the rails we've already built — and banks can plug in and run regional stablecoins on top of that.
Stablecoin payment volume is projected to hit $1.5 quadrillion by 2035. Do you think that number is real?
I think it's much less — as in, much less than what it will actually be. Right now we've only scratched the surface. Visa alone settles multiple trillions every year just on card spending. Now imagine the volume in corporate treasuries, businesses moving money globally. And then add sovereign stablecoins — right now only US dollar stablecoins are dominant. When sovereign stablecoins arrive and cross-border settlement becomes near-instant, the money moving will be at the scale of the entire global economy.
Thank you so much for being here with us today.
Thank you.
