More than one seat
The bank names around OUSD invite a simple story: traditional finance has chosen its digital successor. I would resist that reading. A bank can be a distributor, reserve-service provider, payments intermediary or investor, and it can pursue more than one arrangement at once.
Open Standard's announcement attributes to BBVA an ambition to bring stablecoin capabilities to retail and corporate clients. That is a statement of intended utility, not proof that every listed bank has launched an OUSD product. 1
BBVA separately announced a group of twenty-one financial institutions planning another stablecoin enterprise, subject to closing conditions, with a proposed market entry in the first half of 2027. That separate initiative should not be confused with Open Standard. 2
A hedge against being left out
My interpretation is that participation can preserve options. A bank may want to learn how customers use a new rail, retain the client relationship, and help shape standards without committing all of its payment business to one token. This is a plausible commercial explanation, not a statement of undisclosed boardroom motives.
There are also conflicting interests within banking. A service line may earn from custody or reserve accounts while another faces pressure on transfer fees. A large institution receiving concentrated reserve deposits may experience different effects from a smaller institution losing customer balances.
That is why 'banks benefit' and 'banks lose' are poor substitutes for tracing balance sheets. The reserve allocation, the source of customer funds and the location of the receiving deposits all matter.
What the evidence can establish
A BIS working paper published on 13 October 2026 finds evidence that reserve-backed stablecoins and bank deposits are partial substitutes in its historical US data. It explicitly does not establish that stablecoin growth necessarily reduces aggregate bank deposits or lending. It is not an OUSD impact study. 3
For an individual OUSD participant, the reporting question remains specific: what service will it provide, what funds will it attract, and what obligations will it assume? A bank's name on a coalition list cannot supply those numbers.
I see a market in which institutions are building entrances on several sides of the same changing system. That can be sensible strategy. Whether customers gain from it depends on the services that arrive, their prices and their protections—not on the number of seats a bank reserves at announcement time.
Ilhan Irem Yuce
The record behind the file
Company statements are attributed; analysis belongs to the author. Desk research does not constitute an independent reserve, legal or security audit.
- Open Standard — Introducing Open USD (30 June 2026) ↗Company announcement and attributed partner statements; evidence of stated intentions, not independently verified deployment.
- BBVA — Banks to establish a separate stablecoin enterprise (1 September 2026) ↗Separate bank initiative, not Open Standard; announced timing and closing conditions distinguished from live operations.
- BIS Working Paper 1382 — Are stablecoins and bank deposits substitutes? (13 October 2026) ↗Empirical work on 2019–2025 data, not an OUSD study; association and modelling limitations retained.