Over the years, the biggest winners in the on-chain ecosystem are not necessarily the star public chains or those hot DeFi projects. If we had to say who truly changed the game, it would be stablecoins. They did something that seems simple but is actually profound—the transformation of the dollar into an asset that can be programmed at any time. Imagine: 24/7 transfers, instant settlement, borderless movement, and the ability to nest within various financial protocols for yield and leverage. It sounds like the ultimate dream of fintech.

But ideals are lofty, and reality is often harsh. As the scale of stablecoins grows larger and larger, a fundamental contradiction has emerged—they are forced to serve two completely different roles simultaneously. On one hand, they are on-chain assets supporting transactions, collateralization, and market-making; on the other hand, they are real-world payment tools and clearing networks, handling transfers, settlements, and daily consumption. These two identities have completely opposite demands on the underlying network.

Most general-purpose public chains are designed like a multifunctional operating system—applications can run, assets can be issued, and finance can be conducted, seemingly capable of everything. But when stablecoins want to truly scale for payments and global clearing, all the flaws of these general chains are magnified: gas fees fluctuate wildly, network congestion causes slow confirmations, users need to hold some L1 tokens to move funds, and cross-chain liquidity is fragmented beyond recognition.

In the DeFi circle, people can grit their teeth and endure. But in payment and clearing scenarios? It’s almost unusable. Try it—can you develop a dollar transfer app for ordinary users, and then tell them they need to buy a certain token on the exchange first? Or during peak times, the cost of a transfer suddenly jumps from $0.50 to $5? That’s simply not realistic. Ordinary people’s wallets don’t have the patience to understand these technical details.

The story of Plasma emerged at this turning point. It proposed a more pragmatic approach: stablecoins actually need a chain that functions more like a clearing network, rather than a "universal public chain" trying to do everything. From a different perspective, if we redesign a chain where stablecoins—especially USD₮—become the primary citizens, built from the ground up around core needs like minimal transfer costs, fastest settlement speeds, and the best user experience, what would that look like?

This is not some radical sci-fi idea, but a sober judgment based on a thorough diagnosis of the current on-chain ecosystem. The future of stablecoins may not lie in competing on general-purpose chains, but in specialization and becoming a clearing network.