Stablecoins will allow companies to shift to a financial streaming model that could free up trillions in capital for new investment, says Paul Brody. Things may look different in the future. If it costs nothing to move money globally and it can be done nearly instantly, the size of those local buffers can be dramatically reduced. Instead of keeping two weeks’ worth of expenses locally, including payroll, you might just choose to keep only a day’s worth on hand. A slightly larger cash pile can be kept centrally and sent out as needed. Companies could rebalance their global cash holdings every six hours. The result: a significant decrease in working capital requirements. What may start at a global level for large firms could spread quickly, and not just in the B2B space. At 5% interest rates, a $10 debt over the course of a year generates $0.50 in interest at current rates, which is about $0.04 per month. Each week of “float” you can save (or earn) is worth roughly $0.01. Given that payment costs on Ethereum Layer 2 networks are now routinely below $0.01, the answer is yes, it is worth it. Transaction costs are headed in only one direction, which means the economically efficient size and frequency of managing your money only gets more granular. Once upon time, the idea of streaming music on demand – and all the bandwidth and computation needed to do that – was seen as ridiculous. Now, it is barely a drop in the bucket compared to video streaming. There is no reason to think payments are different. Shifting to a financial streaming model could literally free up trillions in capital for new investment. Incentives for things like using services or energy at off-peak times might be much more effective when the payout is immediate.