PhotonPay Raises $40 Million Series C Led by Blockchain Capital to Link Stablecoin Wallets With Cards and Local Clearing
Hong Kong-based PhotonPay closed a $40 million Series C led by Blockchain Capital, with SBI Group joining; it reports a $65 billion annualised transaction volume as of August 2026, 34 licences and 4.4 million cards issued in 12 months, and plans MCP support for AI agents.
By Daniel Osei, Journalist, Payments and Cards
PhotonPay, the Hong Kong cross-border payments company, has closed a $40 million Series C round led by Blockchain Capital, it said on 30 October 2026. SBI Group joined as a new investor, and existing investors IDG Capital, GL Ventures and Lightspeed Faction followed on. PhotonPay did not disclose a valuation.
The company says the money will go into what it calls a stablecoin-centric "Financial OS": multi-asset wallets holding stablecoins and fiat together, global card issuing, local clearing infrastructure in key markets and an execution layer for AI agents.
PhotonPay's own numbers
All of the following are company figures from the funding release:
Metric — PhotonPay figure
Annualised transaction volume — $65 billion (as of August 2026; a run rate)
Licences and regulatory authorisations — 34, across the Americas, Europe and Asia
Business customers — More than 200,000, in 200+ countries and territories
Cards issued, past 12 months — 4.4 million, up 275% year on year
Local collection accounts — 17 markets, 60+ currencies received
Payout routes — 100+, including 74 local e-wallets
Payout speed — ~97% within hours or same day; 68% in real time
Enterprise and platform partners — More than 100
PhotonPay names J.P. Morgan, Standard Chartered and DBS as institutional partners, and connections to Brazil's Pix and Mexico's SPEI.
Stablecoins in the middle, licences at the edges
The pitch is that stablecoins move value between businesses quickly, but the money still has to land in a local account, a supplier's bank or a card. That last step needs licences, banking relationships and access to domestic clearing in each market, which software cannot replicate. PhotonPay's chief compliance officer, JP Pi, put it directly: establishing local financial capabilities "takes years of investment, institutional partnerships, and regulatory engagement."
That makes this round less a bet on stablecoin technology than on the regulated distribution around it: the licences, clearing access and card issuing that turn an on-chain balance into a local payment. Eiichiro So, chief executive of SBI Ven Capital, said the firms would explore "opportunities for strategic collaboration across the SBI Group ecosystem", without naming any.
Agents: planned, not live
PhotonPay says it completed a live agentic payment demonstration with Mastercard in May 2026 using a tokenised PhotonPay card. Its next steps are plans: support for the Model Context Protocol (MCP) so AI agents can read balances and start payments, and a policy-based framework to enforce spending limits and authorisation rules set by businesses. No launch dates were given.
Sources
- PhotonPay via PR Newswire, PhotonPay Raises $40M Series C to Scale Its Stablecoin-Centric Financial OS (30 October 2026)