PayPal’s PYUSD has emerged as the third fastest growing stablecoin since the U.S stablecoin law, the GENIUS Act, became effective six months ago.
On some fronts, PYUSD’s growth has rivaled even Circle’s USDC, which posted the second-best performance over the same period.
Amid the explosive traction, can PYUSD really rival USDC in the future?
USDC vs PYUSD – Supply changes in H2 2025
According to Artemis data, Tether’s USDT, the most dominant U.S-based stablecoin, led in supply growth, adding $26.3 billion to its market cap in H2 2025.
Circle posted half of USDT’s performance and added $13.9 billion to its market supply, lifting its overall market cap from $62.6 to $76.5 billion. PayPal’s PYUSD ranked third as its market cap increased by $2.8 billion and hit $3.6 billion.
Source: Artemis
USDC’s growth was 5x more than PYUSD in absolute dollar added to market cap. However, in percentage terms, PYUSD grew by 335% while USDC posted a 22% surge.
In other words, PYUSD expanded faster than USDC in H2 2025.
Assessing transaction volume and users
Apart from the supply change, PYUSD also recorded strong momentum based on active transaction volume in the last 30 days. It had a total transaction volume of $357 million, translating to a 72% surge over a 30-day period, according to Artemis.
On the contrary, USDC had a transaction volume of $223 billion or 68% at press time. This implied that it was 625x larger than PYUSD despite the massive momentum.
Put differently, the combination of supply expansion and transaction growth meant PYUSD might be in an early acceleration phase. The product is only 2 years old compared to USDC’s +7 years of operation.
However, USDC’s larger volume meant its scale of expansion still dwarfed PYUSD’s reach. In fact, USDC had an average of 1 million daily users in early 2026, up from 800k during the December market lull.
Source: Artemis
For PYUSD, the daily active users (yellow) hovered around 4000-6000, way below USDC’s activity.
This could boil down to the distribution channels and utility for each stablecoin. Notably, USDC and PYUSD both offer yield, but USDC has a wide distribution network, including Coinbase, and is widely used across Ethereum [ETH] DeFi and other ecosystems.
Source: Artemis (PYUSD)
On the other hand, PYUSD, which is pitched as a payment stablecoin, has also established its distribution network. And yet, it remains limited and isn’t widely used in the DeFi space.
Overall, PYUSD made it top three stablecoins based on supply growth, backed by massive early adoption, and could rival USDC in the future. However, its limited usage may continue to give USDC a lead.
Final Thoughts
- PYUSD has seen the fastest supply growth and momentum post-GENIUS Act.
- However, PYUSD’s overall usage might be relatively limited compared to USDC’s extensive distribution network.