MoneyGram has moved money across borders for more than 80 years. The company serves over 60 million active customers today. Its network spans roughly 500,000 retail locations across more than 200 countries and territories. More than 70% of its transactions now start digitally, according to the company. That footprint is the asset, and MoneyGram is now wiring it directly into public blockchains.
The last twelve months made that shift explicit. MoneyGram launched MGUSD on Stellar in June 2026. It became a Solana validator later that same month. Then it took Ramps multi-chain in August, connecting Solana wallets to cash in 170 countries.
Justine Van Buren leads global partnerships at MoneyGram as executive vice president. She holds an MBA from MIT Sloan and previously ran marketplace businesses at Walmart eCommerce. At MoneyGram, she owns strategic partnerships, pricing, and revenue operations. Speaking with Genfinity’s Ryan Solomon, she laid out the thinking behind the multi-chain push.
MoneyGram has spent years connecting blockchain networks to real-world money movement. That work is now expanding across networks and products.
— Generation Infinity (@Genfinity) September 9, 2026
We interviewed MoneyGram EVP of Global Partnerships Justine Van Buren about the company’s growing role across digital assets and… pic.twitter.com/puZ2GPXjT3
The problem came first, then the technology
Van Buren frames MoneyGram’s crypto work as an extension of one long-running mission. The company exists to help people move money across borders. Stablecoins simply make that job cheaper and faster.
She splits the benefit into two parts. First, stablecoins act as financial infrastructure for the business itself. They offer an internet native way to hold and move value globally. Consequently, MoneyGram reduces the time, effort, and cost embedded in settlement.
Second, customers feel the result directly. “The experience to just feel like it’s money working better,” Van Buren said. Funds arrive faster with less friction and more flexibility. Importantly, customers keep the same regulatory disclosures they had before.
The cost angle matters more than it might sound. Sending remittances still costs an average of 6.36% globally, according to World Bank data. The United Nations target sits at 3%. Meanwhile, global remittance flows topped $857 billion in 2025 and are projected to cross $900 billion this year. Small percentage reductions translate into billions of dollars staying with families.
Stellar as the exclusive rail
MoneyGram and the Stellar Development Foundation started working together in 2021. Cash-to-USDC ramps went live the following year. In April 2026, the two organizations extended the partnership to scale stablecoin utility globally.
Van Buren argues the relationship works because of how it started. Much of crypto begins with a technology and hunts for a problem afterward. MoneyGram and Stellar reversed that order. They asked how to make financial services more accessible, then built toward the answer.
The result is an end-to-end stack rather than a single integration. At its center sits Balance, MoneyGram’s in-app wallet product. Stellar serves as the exclusive blockchain infrastructure for it. Customers receive funds instantly into a USD denominated balance inside the MoneyGram app. They can hold those digital dollars or withdraw cash through the local MoneyGram network.
Van Buren said Balance is live in Colombia, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, and Paraguay. MoneyGram publicly confirmed Colombia and El Salvador in its April announcement. Additional Central and South American markets were slated to follow through 2026.
MGUSD is the asset that sits inside that wallet. Bridge, a Stripe company, issues the token as a regulated, GENIUS Act ready issuer. M0 supplies the smart contract infrastructure that mints and burns supply. Fireblocks handles wallet infrastructure and custody. The token is native to Stellar, and ramps drive utility in and out of the wallet.
Why Solana, and why now
MoneyGram Ramps exists to solve one thing. It connects digital assets to the real world through a single API. Van Buren describes the underlying thesis plainly. MoneyGram believes this is a multi-chain world.
“Customers, developers shouldn’t be limited by which blockchain they choose,” she said. Under that framing, Solana became an obvious next step. It ranks among the largest blockchain ecosystems by developer activity. Its infrastructure targets fast, low-cost transactions. Notably, the developer community there is both broad and active.
MoneyGram did not stop at an integration. It became an active Solana validator in June 2026 and joined the Solana Developer Platform. Solana is the company’s third validator commitment. MoneyGram also serves as anchor remittance validator on Tempo, the Stripe-backed payments chain. It holds a validator stake on Midnight, Cardano’s privacy-focused sidechain.
Ramps followed onto Solana in August. Cash-out coverage spans more than 170 countries and territories. Cash-in currently reaches more than 25 countries. Rift, an AI-powered trading app, became the first Solana wallet to integrate. Before that launch, Solana users had to bridge USDC to Stellar to reach MoneyGram’s cash network.
Solomon noted how much has changed in five years. Large payment incumbents once watched blockchain from a distance. Now they run validators and ship developer tooling. MoneyGram’s posture reflects that shift clearly.
The last mile gets more valuable, not less
Solomon asked whether physical distribution loses relevance as activity moves onchain. Van Buren argued the opposite case.
“I actually think physical becomes more important as we continue to digitize financial activity,” she said. Moving value onto a blockchain solves only half the problem. Bringing that value into someone’s hands remains the harder half. Roughly 500,000 physical locations exist because the last mile has always mattered.
Her framing treats MoneyGram as a bridge rather than a destination. Value can cross the world in seconds onchain. However, people still live, work, and spend in local economies. MoneyGram connects the onchain economy to those communities.
She extends interoperability beyond the technical definition. Flexibility of choice matters most for the consumer. The strongest networks will connect cash, bank accounts, wallets, cards, and stablecoins in one ecosystem. Additionally, the customer experience should stay familiar. “It’s the same way you use it today,” she said. “It just works better.”
That thesis already has commercial validation. In May 2026, Kraken partnered with MoneyGram to let users cash out crypto in more than 100 countries. The exchange gained access to the same retail footprint.
Beyond remittances
MoneyGram built its reputation on remittances. Van Buren sees a larger opportunity underneath that category. The core challenge is not sending money. It is access to the basic tools for holding and using money at all.
She pointed to The Onchain Effect, a documentary produced with Stellar and Decaf. It follows Zac Borrowdale, an Australian who settled in San Francisco, Colombia. He started businesses there and employed local residents. Almost nobody in the town holds a bank account.
Paying those workers required a trip to Medellín. Borrowdale withdrew months of payroll in cash from ATMs across the city. That routine made him a target. One day he was shot and robbed for the cash.
The fix ran through stablecoin rails. Borrowdale now pays employees in USDC into their Decaf wallets. Those employees still withdraw cash at a MoneyGram location whenever they need it. Nothing changed about their habits, only the plumbing behind them.
The numbers behind Decaf show the pattern scaling. The wallet off-ramps roughly $200,000 in USDC weekly on Stellar. Its users span six continents. Van Buren treats the story as evidence that democratizing financial services is a core economic project.
The read
MoneyGram is making a specific structural bet. It assumes no single chain wins, so it refuses to pick one. MGUSD anchors to Stellar, while Ramps expands across networks and validator roles multiply.
The strategy has a clear logic. Blockchains commoditize the movement of value. Cash distribution does not commoditize easily, because it requires decades of physical presence and licensing. MoneyGram is therefore selling the scarce half of the stack to every ecosystem that needs it.
Van Buren says the company will keep pulling cost out of the chain and pushing efficiency to customers. Balance expansion continues, and more chains are likely. The open question is whether Ramps cash-in coverage catches up to its 170 country cash-out reach. Until it does, the on-ramp side remains the narrower door.
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