Coins.ph CEO Wei Zhou on Corporate Chains, AI Agents & Asia's Stablecoin Rails: Inside Coinfest 2026

Asia transferred $245 billion in stablecoin volume, but at a panel on August 20th, industry leaders focused on corporate uses rather than consumers at Coinfest Asia. Adriel Wong, TRM Labs' Head of Institutions moderated. Wei Zhou, CEO of coins.ph, Jeannie Lim, Co-Founder and Chief Commercial Officer of xweave, Tianwei Liu, Co-Founder and Chief Executive of StraitsX, and Patrick Ngan, Co-Founder and Chief Executive of Alchemy Pay joined the discussion.

Jeannie Lim explained xweave's shift from a B2C remittance service to corporate treasuries, offering faster and cheaper transfers. Patrick Ngan echoed Lim's findings, with Alchemy Pay focusing on B2B settlement and large volumes. Wei Zhou argued for retail stabilitycoins but cited real-world examples like conflict zone refugees and Chinese consumers wanting to purchase AI services.

Wei Zhou's route into retail involved Philippine merchants accepting USDT and USDC at QR payment points, with the goal of displaying stablecoin logos next to Visa and Mastercard. Tianwei Liu, running consumer stablecoin payments at scale in Singapore, explained how QR payments in Singapore work without consumers noticing, with merchants receiving T+0 and users experiencing no difference.

The panel's main conclusion was that retail stablecoin payments are effective when consumers are unaware of the transaction's blockchain nature. Wei Zhou also predicted that crypto and AI policies will converge, with jurisdictions that combine pro-stablecoin and pro-growth AI positions seeing faster growth.