Stripe and Paradigm officially launched a layer-1 blockchain called "Tempo", specializing in payments, which has attracted a series of major partners from OpenAI to Deutsche Bank.
Stripe and Paradigm launch Tempo - a layer-1 blockchain dedicated to stablecoins. Photo: AInvest
Stripe , the $92 billion fintech giant, is accelerating its move into the blockchain era. The company recently announced Tempo , a payments-focused layer-1 blockchain , in private testnet with Paradigm .
Introducing Tempo: a payments-first blockchain incubated by Stripe and Paradigm.
— tempo (@tempo) September 4, 2025
As stablecoins go mainstream, there's a need for optimized infrastructure. Tempo is purpose-built for stablecoins and real-world payments, born from Stripe's experience in global payments and…
Stripe CEO Patrick Collison describes Tempo as a payments blockchain optimized for large-scale, real-world financial services applications. Notably, Tempo is organized as an independent company, with Stripe and Paradigm as early investors.
Technology and design platform
Unlike many general-purpose blockchains, Tempo is built specifically for stablecoins and real-world payments, as rumored since mid-August .
High Performance: Aiming for the ability to process more than 100,000 transactions per second (TPS) with a completion time of less than 1 second.
Stablecoin friendly: Users can pay fees (gas) directly with stablecoins.
Integrated AMM: Ensures neutrality, allowing the use of any stablecoin for trading and payments.
EVM Compatibility: Retains compatibility with the Ethereum ecosystem.
Compliance & Privacy: Ensure regulatory compliance while providing privacy options for transactions.
Right from the testing phase, Tempo has attracted a series of big names such as Anthropic, OpenAI, Visa, Deutsche Bank, Standard Chartered, Shopify, Nubank, Revolut, DoorDash. This is a unique combination of AI, traditional banking, fintech, e-commerce and Web3 applications, creating a huge potential network for on-chain payment applications.
Stripe's strategic direction
Tempo is not a one-off move. Previously:
October 2024: Stripe spent $1.1 billion to acquire Bridge , a stablecoin infrastructure company.
June 2024: Stripe partners with Coinbase , integrating layer-2 Base into payment products.
June 2025: Stripe goes on to acquire Privy, a crypto wallet startup.
These successive moves show that Stripe is building an infrastructure empire around stablecoins and blockchain payments, not just “experimenting” with crypto.
Vision
According to Collison, Tempo's goal is to bring activities like payment acceptance, global payments, remittances, Tokenize deposits, automated payments, and more onto the blockchain.
On Paradigm side, Matt Huang, co-founder and managing partner, is leading the Tempo team. “As stablecoins come to life, the world needs an infrastructure optimized for payments,” he said. “Tempo is purpose-built for stablecoins and real-world payments, combining Stripe’s global experience with Paradigm’s crypto expertise.”
Not only Stripe, the blockchain payment race is heating up with the participation of many other "big guys". Google recently announced GCUL (Google Cloud Universal Ledger), a neutral layer-1 for financial institutions, expected to be commercialized in 2026. Meanwhile, Mastercard and Visa are accelerating the integration of stablecoins into the global payment network, while PayPal has launched the "Pay with Crypto" service to significantly reduce cross-border transaction costs.
Coin68 synthesis
