Coinbase CEO proposes surprising fix to $60B remittance fees

Global remittances are estimated to have reached around $905 billion in 2024-2025.

As per the World Bank, the global average fees stood at 6.36% in the third quarter of 2025. It means the total remittance fees last year stood at an estimated $57.55 billion.

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Banks remain the most expensive type of service provider, with an average fee of 14.99%.

While post offices’ fees stood at 5.58%, money transfer operators (MTOs) charged 4.72%. Mobile operators are among the cheapest service providers at 5.58%.

Credit or debit cards are among the cheapest service providers, with 4.39% to originate remittances and 3.61% to receive remittances.

But Brian Armstrong, the billionaire CEO of the largest crypto trading exchange in the U.S., thinks it could cost "zero" to send remittances.

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Armstrong touts stablecoins as remittance avenue

Coinbase (Nasdaq: COIN) CEO Brian Armstrong wrote an X post on Apr. 27 in which he highlighted that an estimated $60 billion was spent on remittance fees in 2025, but this cost could come down to zero with stablecoins.

A stablecoin is a type of cryptocurrency that, unlike traditionally volatile cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) or Ethereum (ETH), tries to keep its value stable by being pegged 1:1 to a "stable" asset like the U.S. dollar.

As per DeFiLlama, the total stablecoin market cap stood at $320.45 billion at the time of writing.

Tether's USDT (59%) and Circle's USDC (24%) are the two most popular stablecoins. These stablecoins are essentially "digital dollars" because the value of one USDT or USDC is the same as that of one U.S. dollar.

Stablecoins have become an increasingly popular medium of cross-border transfers because they are quick to transfer, cost less, and the payment rails facilitating these transfers remain active even on weekends and outside traditional banking hours.

Now, this is exactly the remittance alternative that Armstrong is trying to hype.

In fact, Coinbase's relationship with the stablecoin giant Circle goes a long way back as the two companies co-founded the Centre Consortium to launch USDC in 2018. Any crypto user can earn rewards by simply holding USDC with Coinbase.

When Coinbase posted its 2025 earnings, it reported generating $1.34 billion in stablecoin revenue due to USDC held in Coinbase products.

Armstrong has also been waging a battle on behalf of the crypto industry to get the CLARITY Act passed without any compromise on stablecoin rewards—which the banking industry insists are a threat to traditional savings accounts.

While Armstrong is enthusiastic about stablecoins becoming an alternative to other remittance avenues, a McKinsey report published in February told a different picture.

Most of stablecoin activity consists of trading, internal fund shuffling, and automated blockchain activity and doesn't facilitate use cases like paying suppliers or sending remittances, the report said.

Related: Explained: What is a stablecoin?