The challenge: trapped liquidity

dLocal processes local card payments in an emerging market for its enterprise merchants operating in the region. While collections were working smoothly, the real problem emerged when trying to repatriate those funds.

Traditional banking routes were often slow and hard to navigate, with delays in converting local currencies and moving them offshore. The result was a buildup of local currency, creating operational inefficiencies and tying up capital that could otherwise be deployed elsewhere.

As dLocal looked to scale, it needed a more reliable way to move money cross-border, without compromising on compliance or introducing unnecessary risk.

The solution: accelerated cross-border settlement via BVNK

dLocal turned to BVNK to explore whether stablecoins could offer a viable way to unlock trapped capital.

Using BVNK’s platform, dLocal was able to:

• Convert local currencies into stablecoins
• Move funds in minutes using blockchain rails, bypassing any potential banking delays
• Convert those stablecoins into euros, and settle into European bank accounts
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The flow was managed end-to-end within BVNK’s platform – giving dLocal the speed, visibility, and a compliance framework it needed to operate confidently at scale.

What made the solution work wasn’t just the technology, it was the flexible infrastructure and ability to tailor the setup to dLocal’s operational model. It meant dLocal’s finance team could reduce the time between collection and upstream settlement from days to minutes, freeing up liquidity and reducing exposure to currency volatility.

The results

• Unlocked trapped capital
• Significantly faster settlement cycles, improving working capital efficiency
• A foundation for expansion, as dLocal now extend stablecoin flows to merchant payouts
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What began as a solution to a treasury problem has now evolved into a strategic capability. dLocal has expanded its use of BVNK’s infrastructure to accelerate crossborder payments for its merchants across LATAM, EMEA and APAC, opening up new ways to serve enterprise clients in emerging or high-cost FX markets.

Using BVNK’s infrastructure, dLocal now enables its global merchants to fund cross-border payouts using stablecoins instead of wire transfers, accelerating payment cycles.

“dLocal is constantly exploring ways to expand access and improve settlement times for our clients,” said John O’Brien, CRO at dLocal. “By integrating BVNK’s stablecoin capabilities, we can offer even faster, borderless payments - without compromising compliance or control.”

Expanding the partnership

As the partnership deepened, so did the use cases.

Today, dLocal is:

• Enabling merchants to prefund its cross border payments in stablecoins.
• Sending stablecoins to its payout providers or liquidity partners to manage final conversion into local currencies.
• Netting same-currency stablecoin flows to reduce conversion costs and streamline their operational costs.
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dLocal relies on BVNK as a critical layer in its global payments engine, supporting its merchants with speed, flexibility, and control.

At the same time, customers of our Layer1 platform, will soon be able to fund cross-border payments using stablecoins, and have them delivered to recipients in local fiat currencies through dLocal’s network, via the Layer1 API.

Together, we’re building a new layer of financial interoperability, connecting blockchain-native value transfer with regulated, fiat-based local settlement rails across 40+ markets.

Why it matters

This was one of the first examples of a global PSP implementing the “stablecoin sandwich” - which has now become common industry language for this use case – using stablecoins at enterprise scale to improve treasury operations and speed up global payments. The impact was clear: faster access to funds, less friction, and a more modern approach to emerging market payments.

For companies operating across multiple jurisdictions and currencies, stablecoin-based settlement is no longer experimental – it’s practical and scalable. With BVNK as a trusted partner, dLocal now has the infrastructure in place to meet merchant demand, expand into new markets, and solve similar challenges wherever they arise.