Wood Sounds Alarm on Visa and Mastercard Analysts' Stablecoin Blindspot

Cathie Wood has been vocal about her conviction that Circle Internet Group poses a significant threat to traditional payment companies like Visa and Mastercard. In an August 23 statement, she argued that Wall Street analysts are sleeping on this disruption.

Despite Circle's shares climbing 84% since its June 2025 IPO, Visa and Mastercard have barely budged this year, posting year-to-date gains of just 5% and 1%, respectively. Wood views this gap as a sign of market inefficiency, not market wisdom.

Circle's recent financial performance supports Wood's thesis. The company reported net income of $48 million in Q2 2026, a sharp reversal from a loss in the prior-year period. Transaction revenue doubled over the same stretch.

The engine behind these results is USDC, Circle's dollar-pegged stablecoin, which now commands 62% of market share in stablecoin transaction volumes. This dominance translated into roughly $849 billion in transaction volume as of July 2026.