As delivery platform DoorDash and Meta begin experiments with stablecoin-based payments, a forecast has emerged that the market could grow to $4 trillion by 2030.

On May 6 (local time), blockchain media outlet The Block Crypto reported that Bitwise Chief Investment Officer Matt Hougan said big tech payment experiments could help lift stablecoin supply, now about $300 billion, into the trillions of dollars.

The assessment is based on pilots by operating companies. DoorDash is working with Stripe to test paying 10 million couriers who operate in more than 40 countries in stablecoins. Meta is also introducing a similar program for creators in the Philippines and Colombia. Meta is making payments using the Solana and Polygon blockchains, and Hougan noted the experiment connects with the global creator economy, estimated at 200 million people.

Hougan drew a line, saying the current pilot scale itself is not large. "These experiments are not a big deal in relative terms," he said, adding that the dollar-denominated scale is still small. Even so, he said such cases increased his "conviction" that stablecoins will grow into a trillion-dollar asset class.

He focused on the structure rather than costs. Stablecoins can enable payments at the level of a few cents instead of the tens of dollars required for bank transfers, but he explained that the larger advantage DoorDash and Meta see is simplicity. Hougan said the key is that a global company can make millions of small payments using only a single wallet address, without separate banking infrastructure or currency conversion procedures.

Hougan also mentioned the possibility that this structure will not be limited to specific companies. "All global technology companies that have platform-based workers such as couriers and freelancers will follow DoorDash and Meta," he said. "In the process, millions of users will flow into the crypto ecosystem," he added.

The market size is already growing. Supply of dollar-pegged stablecoins has topped $302 billion. Of that, Tether's USDT accounts for about $189.5 billion and Circle's USDC about $79 billion. If big tech payment experiments lead to actual commercialization, the structure could directly affect expansion in existing issuance volumes as well.

Traditional payments companies are also accelerating infrastructure expansion. Western Union launched its stablecoin USDPT on Solana and began supporting 24-hour payments across a network in more than 200 countries. Visa also said the annualized processed volume of its stablecoin payment pilot reached $7 billion. Visa expanded the supported blockchains to 9, card programs to more than 130, and pushed the number of countries where it is applied past 50.

This trend is seen as a test bed for whether stablecoins can be used as a global payments infrastructure beyond being an exchange-traded asset. The DoorDash and Meta cases, in particular, show that stablecoin use is expanding beyond investment or cutting remittance fees, toward solving small-settlement issues for large platforms. Going forward, the key points to watch are whether such pilots convert into always-on services and whether more platform companies incorporate stablecoins into their payment systems.