Visa Direct puts USDC prefunding into production with Inyo

Visa has moved USDC prefunding for Visa Direct from pilot to commercial production with Inyo Global, giving eligible businesses a near-real-time way to fund cross-border payouts. Visa said on Oct. 15 that Inyo is the first enabler of the service. Its announcement says availability depends on eligibility and geography.

Prefunding is the step where a payment business supplies money for payouts before they are sent. Under the new option, a business using Inyo can fund that activity with USDC, the dollar stablecoin, through Inyo’s platform. Visa Direct then handles the payouts. The change is on the funding side: the announcement describes businesses funding payouts with USDC, not recipients receiving USDC.

How does Inyo’s USDC funding option work?

Inyo has integrated the capability into its payments platform. A business connects through Inyo’s existing APIs, uses USDC to prefund cross-border payouts, and sends those payouts through Visa Direct. Visa says the funding can happen in near real time, so the business does not have to rely solely on traditional funding windows.

Inyo serves money transmitters, fintechs, banks and payment businesses. Its platform also supports onboarding, fraud and compliance management, and payment acceptance. Visa says the platform provides domestic and international payouts across more than 180 countries through Visa Direct; that figure describes the platform’s reach, not confirmed availability of USDC prefunding in every country.

Who can use the service, and what changed?

Eligible Visa Direct clients and partners using Inyo can access the option, subject to geographic and other eligibility requirements. Inyo co-founder and chief product and technology officer Robson Dantas said the capability runs through the same Inyo APIs its customers already use, according to The Block’s report.

The production launch follows Visa’s stablecoin prefunding and payout pilots, which the company introduced through Visa Direct in 2025. Prefunding and payouts are separate parts of a payment flow: prefunding supplies liquidity before a payout, while a payout delivers money to its recipient. Visa’s announcement confirms this production move concerns prefunding.

What does the announcement leave unspecified?

Visa has not publicly named a blockchain network, transaction volumes or fees for this implementation in its announcement. It also does not provide a full list of eligible clients or geographies. For now, the confirmed change is that Inyo has brought USDC prefunding into commercial use for eligible Visa Direct clients, adding an around-the-clock funding option to its platform.

Sources

• announcement — corporate.visa.com
• The Block’s report — theblock.co