One of the world’s largest financial institutions is collaborating with Wealthsimple.
Visa Canada this week unveiled a partnership with the Toronto-based fintech upstart to bring stablecoin settlement to the Canadian market through a pilot program.
Moving forward, Wealthsimple can satisfy settlement obligations with Visa Canada in USDC. This marks a milestone in Visa’s global stablecoin strategy, according to a statement from the firms, and underscores both companies’ commitment to modernizing the payment infrastructure underpinning commerce across Canada.
Visa “was one of the first major payment networks in the world to settle transactions in stablecoin, and grew that capability into a proven, global pilot program now processing billions in settlement volume,” notes Michiel Wielhouwer, who serves Visa Canada as country manager.
“Canada is a natural home for what comes next,” he says.
By bringing stablecoin settlement to Canada with Wealthsimple, “we are building the infrastructure that lets the best ideas in money movement become reality at scale,” Wielhouwer stated.
“Canadian innovation deserves world-class rails,” he said, “and that is what we are here to provide.”
With Wealthsimple will serve as the first partner in Canada for Visa’s pilot, which lays groundwork for broader capabilities as regulation, technology, and market demand continue to mature.
Stablecoins represent a “fundamental shift in how money moves faster, smarter, and without the constraints of legacy systems,” according to Hanna Zaidi, vice president of payments strategy for Wealthsimple.
“We see this pilot as the first of many opportunities for Canada to build towards a more dynamic and efficient payments system,” Zaidi remarked.
The pilot with Wealthsimple launches at the same time that Visa released its Agentic Ready program to issuers in Canada.
The Agentic Ready program is designed to help the Canadian payments ecosystem prepare for next-gen commerce, where AI agents act on behalf of consumers to initiate and complete transactions at scale.
The program builds on Visa Intelligent Commerce, Visa’s portfolio of initiatives enabling AI-driven commerce experiences, and is tailored to reflect the priorities and foundations of the Canadian market.
Agentic Ready is powered by Visa’s core trust infrastructure, bringing together tokenization, identity, authentication, risk management, and controls to support agent-initiated payments.
Visa Agentic Ready “gives Canadian issuers a meaningful head start in preparing for agent-initiated commerce,” says Wielhouwer. “The program provides a controlled environment to test and validate how agent-initiated payments can operate responsibly within Canada, while building the confidence needed to move these experiences from concept to reality, on the secure payment rails people rely on every day.”
Early issuing partners participating in the Canadian program include BMO, CIBC, RBC, Scotiabank, and TD.
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