Crypto checkouts in the US move from “pilot” to “default”

A new report produced for PayPal says 39% of US small and medium-sized businesses already accept crypto payments, while another 27% plan to add it soon.

That’s a big deal. True, everyone won’t suddenly want to pay for coffee in ETH. But merchants are starting to treat crypto rails as normal payment infrastructure.

What PayPal’s data actually tells us

The headline number (“nearly 40%”) is just the surface. The more revealing part is intent:

• Acceptance is no longer niche: 39% already accept crypto.
• Adoption pressure is building: 27% plan to enable crypto payments in the next 12 months.

In other words: even if you never pay with crypto yourself, the businesses you buy from are increasingly preparing for customers who will.

Why this is happening now

Merchants don’t adopt new payment methods for fun. They do it when at least one of these becomes true:

1) They want more buyers.Crypto users are global, digital-native, and already comfortable moving value across borders.

2) They want fewer payment headaches.Chargebacks, cross-border friction, settlement delays - traditional card rails aren’t designed for always-on internet commerce.

3) They want stablecoin economics. A growing share of “crypto payments” isn’t volatile assets - it’s stablecoins, because merchants want predictable revenue, not FX risk.

PayPal’s own moves underline this direction. The company has been expanding stablecoin-based infrastructure (including PYUSD initiatives and partnerships) to make on-chain payments feel “normal” for both merchants and consumers.

And it’s not just PayPal. Traditional payment giants are also leaning in. Visa, for example, has been pushing stablecoin settlement rails for faster, always-on settlement in the U.S.

What this means for DeFi

Here’s the part most people miss: checkout is a liquidity problem.

To pay with crypto (or stablecoins) at scale, you need:

• deep liquidity across venues (so swaps don’t get punished by slippage),
• smart routing (so the user gets competitive pricing across available liquidity sources),
• reliable, safe transaction flows (so signing doesn’t become a phishing trap).

That’s where DeFi infrastructure matters. If crypto is becoming a mainstream payment option, the underlying plumbing needs to behave like one: fast, liquid and predictable.

Projects like 1inch offer answers to liquidity fragmentation: you don’t want users (or merchants) to care where liquidity sits. You want them to care about outcomes: price, speed and security.

What to watch next

If this “40% at checkout” trend continues, a few things will accelerate:

• More stablecoin-denominated commerce (less volatility, more utility).
• More conversion at the edge (users hold one asset, pay in another, instantly).
• More demand for secure UX (because scammers will follow adoption).

The takeaway is simple: payments are becoming on-chain - quietly, merchant by merchant. And as that happens, DeFi stops being “an alternative system” and starts becoming part of everyday transaction infrastructure.

The U.S. market remains strategically important for 1inch, and we engage with partners to support compliant infrastructure development.

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