Standard Chartered's institutional crypto trading subsidiary, Zodia Markets, processed more stablecoin volume denominated in Turkish lira than in euros or any other G10 currency during 2025, according to the firm's 2025 annual report and comments published Monday by co-founder Nick Philpott. The finding, which surprised even Philpott, points to a structural shift in how businesses use stablecoins in high-inflation markets: not as a speculative bet, but as a practical substitute for slow and expensive bank-to-bank transfers.

Zodia handled $110.5 billion in dollar-pegged stablecoin transactions across 2025, placing those tokens firmly in first place. But the second spot went to stablecoins tied to the Turkish lira, with $3.4 billion in volume. Euro-pegged stablecoins trailed well behind, reaching only tens of millions of dollars. "Our second-largest currency in terms of stablecoins last year was not the euro or any G10 currency as one perhaps would've expected, but rather the Turkish lira," said Philpott, co-founder and interim CEO of Zodia Markets.

Philpott was explicit about why clients used lira-pegged tokens. "The TRY stablecoins were simply faster to settle, far more reliable to settle, cheaper to settle, and we would liquidate them more or less immediately on receipt, or certainly each day," he said. The use case was operational, not speculative: businesses needed a way to move lira across borders without relying on correspondent banking infrastructure that is often slow and costly in emerging markets.

Turkey's macro backdrop explains the demand

Turkey is the largest crypto market in the Middle East and North Africa by a wide margin. Chainalysis data puts annual crypto transaction volume at roughly $200 billion, nearly four times that of the UAE at approximately $53 billion. An estimated 52 percent of Turkish adults aged 18 to 60 hold digital assets, driven in large part by years of currency erosion. The lira lost more than 450 percent of its domestic purchasing power between 2020 and 2024, and annual inflation was still running near 33 percent as of late 2025, down from an average of 58.5 percent the year before.

Chainalysis has qualified that picture, however, noting that Turkey's crypto boom is built more on speculation than adoption. Retail stablecoin trading volume fell from above $200 million per month in late 2024 to around $70 million by mid-2025 as altcoin speculation eclipsed value-preservation behavior, a dynamic that complicates any straightforward reading of the country as a model of stablecoin-driven financial inclusion.

BiLira's TRYB is the primary lira-pegged stablecoin in circulation. It maintains a 1:1 peg to the lira, holds reserves in Turkish bank accounts, and publishes audit data publicly via Dune Analytics. The token operates across six blockchains, including Ethereum, Avalanche, and Solana. BiLira also runs what it describes as Turkey's largest local over-the-counter trading desk, handling around $300 million in monthly volume. On the same day the Zodia data circulated, Ripple confirmed that its dollar-backed RLUSD token (currently at roughly $1.7 billion in circulating supply) is now available through BiLira, Bitexen, and Bitlo, a move that integrates global dollar liquidity into an existing local-currency stablecoin ecosystem rather than displacing it.

A model with wider implications

The Zodia finding matters beyond Turkey because the underlying problem is not unique to Turkey. Correspondent banking in local currencies is slow, expensive, and unreliable across much of South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Pakistan's rupee has lost roughly 55 percent of its value since 2022. Nigeria posted 412 percent year-over-year growth in USDC volume in 2025, according to BCG data, reflecting intense demand for stable digital value. Bangladesh and Ghana face similar currency pressures.

None of those markets currently have a comparable local-currency stablecoin ecosystem, but the TRY case demonstrates that institutional settlement demand can materialize quickly once basic legal infrastructure is in place. Geoff Kendrick, a crypto analyst at Standard Chartered, noted that future stablecoin growth is most likely in nations with weaker financial infrastructure or limited banking access, a description that fits most of the markets watching Turkey's experience closely, Kendrick said in comments reported by Reuters.

Regulatory limits cap the upside

Turkey's own regulatory evolution illustrates both the opportunity and the ceiling. In 2021, the government banned crypto as a payment instrument, a restriction that remains in force and means stablecoins, while tradeable on licensed platforms, cannot be used for payments under current law. The country licensed crypto asset service providers starting in July 2024 and tightened oversight further through early 2025. In June 2025, the government introduced transfer limits of $3,000 per day and $5,000 per month for stablecoin transactions, alongside mandatory waiting periods of 48 to 72 hours on withdrawals where the travel rule is not applied. Those caps significantly reduce the utility of stablecoins for larger cross-border transactions, and regulators in other emerging markets considering similar frameworks should weigh whether such limits undercut the settlement advantages that made lira tokens attractive in the first place.

The dollar-to-lira ratio in Zodia's volumes (roughly 32 to 1) is a reminder that non-dollar stablecoins remain a fraction of the overall market. Tether's USDT carries approximately $188 billion in circulating supply and USDC sits near $76 billion. But the gap between those figures and $3.4 billion in TRY stablecoin flows at a single institutional venue reads less as a dismissal than a baseline. For a non-dollar currency to reach that level at a Standard Chartered subsidiary, beating the euro in the process, is the kind of data point that tends to attract builders and regulators alike.