Visa Data Reveals: New Leading Altcoin Dominates 70% of the Market

Recent data shared by Visa shows that Circle’s stablecoin USDC has surpassed Tether (USDT) in the transaction volume race, becoming the market’s new leader.

As the balance shifts in the cryptocurrency world, on-chain data provided by payment giant Visa reveals a massive surge in stablecoin usage. In the first half of 2026, USDC, issued by Circle, widened the gap with its biggest rival, Tether (USDT), reaching a dominant position in transaction volume. Especially with the increase in institutional interest, the stablecoin ecosystem has begun to become the center of real economic activities.

As of June 2026, stablecoin activity reached a record level of $1.79 trillion. This figure represents an increase of 63 percent compared to the previous month and 125 percent compared to the same period last year. Visa, while calculating this data, focuses only on transfers with real economic value by filtering out bot transactions and intra-exchange transfers. The results obtained through this method show that USDC accounts for approximately 70 percent of the total volume, while USDT remains at around 25 percent.

USDC Surpasses Tether in Transaction Volume

The increased use of stablecoins by banks and financial institutions for payments, settlements, and treasury operations plays a key role in this shift. Giant institutions such as Standard Chartered and BNY have begun to prefer the USDC network offered by Circle instead of building their own infrastructures. Tether, which dominated 90 percent of the market in 2020, seems to have lost its leadership in the first six months of 2026.

The total volume of $8.82 trillion recorded in the first half of the year has already surpassed the entirety of 2024, proving how much the demand for digital assets has grown. These data provided by Visa clearly demonstrate that user preferences in the market are shifting toward secure and regulated assets.