A new survey shared with The Defiant shows that while many Brazilians appear to trust stablecoins, using them in everyday life is still a challenge.
A July 2025 report from payments app Oobit that surveyed Brazilian crypto users aged 23 to 45 found that around 91.8% hold stablecoins — mostly Tether (USDT) — and about 85% say they want to use crypto for daily purchases. Still, only 54.3% have ever paid with crypto, and just 37% have done so in stores or online.
“Brazil is actively embracing stablecoin adoption. USDT dominates. Crypto literacy is high. And people aren’t just holding – they’re actively engaging on an advanced level. But when it comes to spending? Usage collapses,” Oobit’s report states.
Oobit’s CEO Amram Adar told The Defiant that the survey drew on hundreds of verified Brazilian-based crypto users identified through a third-party tool and in-house research team.
Even those who do spend crypto gave payment tools a 3.28 out of 5 satisfaction score. Survey respondents pointed to high fees (41%) and the fact that few places accept crypto (39%) as the top two barriers.
Other concerns included slow transactions (17%), hard-to-use apps (11%), and other miscellaneous issues (7%).
According to Adar, these problems reflect infrastructure shortcomings more than regulatory or tax-related barriers. “The real challenge is infrastructure,” he explained, adding that most merchants “depend on existing card systems and point-of-sale setups. Asking them to adopt crypto directly means disrupting how they operate, which creates resistance.”
Legal uncertainty only arises when businesses directly handle crypto assets, Adar added. “If the payment is settled in local currency and the merchant never deals with crypto, that legal concern goes away. From the merchant’s perspective, it’s just another card transaction, with no added compliance burden.”
Crypto-Savvy Market
Adar added that Brazilian users rank among “the most advanced crypto participants globally,” noting they’re “holding stablecoins, trading, staking, and eager to use crypto in real life.”
The survey portrays Brazil as a crypto-savvy market, but one still waiting for smoother ways to spend stablecoins daily. Oobit notes in the report that similar trends seem to be emerging in countries like Turkey, Nigeria, Indonesia, and Argentina. “If stablecoins can’t work in Brazil, where there is a digitally fluent, high-trust, crypto-native economy, they’ll struggle everywhere until the rails catch up,” Adar added.
In a mid-June report, blockchain forensic firm Chainalysis warned that stablecoins face a range of risks, from technical flaws to outright scams.
Smart contract vulnerabilities also remain a key concern, as bugs in code could potentially be exploited to drain funds. Custodial breaches are another threat, with hackers potentially gaining access to reserve assets or minting mechanisms, Chainalysis added.