SoFi Tech Solutions, formerly known as Galileo, has announced a strategic partnership with Mexican fintech startup Orbi and global payments giant Mastercard to introduce a groundbreaking cryptocurrency-linked card program in Mexico. The innovative offering is designed to bridge the gap between traditional fiat currency and digital assets, allowing Orbi’s customers to seamlessly utilize both traditional money and balances held in cryptocurrencies during everyday purchases. Through a frictionless conversion process at the point of sale, consumers can spend their digital assets while merchants receive standard fiat currency, eliminating the friction that has historically separated the crypto economy from mainstream retail commerce.
The rollout of this card program comes at a time when digital assets are gaining unprecedented traction across Latin America, driven largely by a shift toward stablecoins. According to regional purchasing data from Bitso for 2025, stablecoins accounted for an impressive 40 percent of all cryptocurrency purchases among users in Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, and Colombia. In comparison, Bitcoin captured 18 percent of transactions during the same period. This milestone marked the first time that stablecoins surpassed Bitcoin in regional purchase volume, underscoring a growing consumer preference for digital currencies pegged to fiat values for daily financial activities and wealth preservation.
Under the terms of the partnership, SoFi Tech Solutions will provide the BIN sponsorship and the underlying financial technology infrastructure powering Orbi’s card program. This comprehensive technological backing encompasses card issuance, transaction authorization, robust processing capabilities, and regulatory compliance. The collaboration with SoFi and its proprietary stablecoin, SoFiUSD, offered a uniquely unified solution that integrated all necessary technical components into a single ecosystem. Furthermore, the versatile platform is engineered to support a wide range of future stablecoin-based use cases as the market continues to mature and evolve.
Kathleen Pierce-Gilmore, president of SoFi Tech Solutions, emphasized the strategic importance of the Mexican market within the broader Latin American financial landscape. She noted that Mexico stands as one of the largest remittance markets globally, where stablecoins are rapidly emerging as a vital and efficient pathway for cross-border money movement. By partnering with Orbi and Mastercard, Pierce-Gilmore explained, the companies are providing Mexican consumers with a secure method to receive, hold, and spend digital dollars, while simultaneously establishing the foundational infrastructure required to support stablecoin-backed payments and cross-border transfers on a massive scale.
The mechanics of the new offering are designed to deliver maximum convenience for the end user. Customers of Orbi will be able to execute purchases using physical and digital payment cards directly linked to their cryptocurrency holdings. At the exact moment of a transaction, the system converts the required digital funds at the point of payment, ensuring that merchants experience a standard, familiar transaction. To facilitate this, SoFi Tech Solutions’ seamless connection with Mastercard’s domestic payment network in Mexico, known as the Mexico Domestic Switch, will efficiently process card-based purchases as well as cash withdrawals at automated teller machines across the country.
Leonardo Pérez, co-founder of Orbi, highlighted that the Orbi Mastercard is the culmination of a close collaboration with SoFi Tech Solutions and Mastercard, a relationship that has steadily deepened since the fintech’s inception. Pérez expressed enthusiasm for building an experience that successfully transforms digital dollars into tangible purchasing power within the real economy. He noted that the initiative provides individuals in Mexico with a familiar, highly accessible way to utilize their digital assets anywhere Mastercard is widely accepted, effectively normalizing the use of alternative currency formats in day-to-day life.
Echoing these sentiments, Silvana Hernández, president of the Northern Division for Mastercard Latin America, emphasized the evolving role of digital assets in modern financial behavior. She observed that digital assets are becoming an increasingly integral component of how people safeguard and move their money, with the primary industry challenge lying in making their utility as simple and dependable as traditional payment methods. By joining forces with SoFi Tech Solutions and Orbi, Hernández stated that Mastercard is enabling seamless stablecoin settlements while successfully connecting digital assets with everyday consumer payment experiences, all backed by the robust security and extensive acceptance of the Mastercard network.
Bringing SoFi’s U.S. Financial Technology Expertise to Latin America
The launch in Mexico marks a significant expansion for SoFi Tech Solutions, which leverages the extensive expertise SoFi has accumulated through building, operating, and scaling digital financial services in the United States. This deep operational knowledge, combined with Galileo’s more than 30-year legacy in payment processing and the advanced core banking capabilities of Technisys, positions financial service providers throughout the region to develop highly connected, digitally focused products. These modern solutions are specifically tailored to meet the dynamic and rapidly changing needs of modern consumers.
The underlying platform is designed to provide comprehensive access to modular financial capabilities, allowing clients to utilize these tools independently or combine them according to their specific strategic requirements. This modularity creates a flexible modernization pathway that enables businesses to upgrade their systems at their own pace, scaling dynamically as their commercial enterprises and customer bases continue to grow and evolve in an increasingly competitive marketplace.
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