Welcome back to the Polygon Weekly Overview, the best place for the Polygon community to get up to speed on the chain’s latest updates, metrics, releases, insights, ecosystem developments and more. All in one place. 

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The percentages and metrics are based on a 7-day timeframe, unless noted otherwise.

🟪 What happened: Polygon recorded 282.1 million stablecoin transfers in January, 28% more than December, and setting a new monthly record for the network. USDC led activity with an all-time high in transfer count, processing $20.8 billion across the month. USDT moved $6 billion and DAI transferred $3 billion, bringing total stablecoin volume to $29.8 billion.

🟪 Why it matters: January marks the fourth consecutive month of all-time high stablecoin transfer activity on Polygon. The network's expanding ecosystem of payment protocols, prediction markets, and agentic commerce platforms continues to drive stablecoin adoption across multiple use cases.

USDC supply grew 84% year-over-year to $1.43 billion, while active addresses hit 2.1 million, reflecting Polygon's pivot from general-purpose scaling to specialized payment infrastructure. 

As Polygon Labs CEO Marc Boiron explained in a recent interview with the Talking Tokens podcast, the network is doubling down on payments, where it has established the strongest track record.

The shift addresses real friction in global money movement. Traditional cross-border payments force banks to route through correspondent networks where "neither bank knows who's going to receive the funds or who sent the funds... [or] how long it's going to stop at another bank," Boiron noted. Polygon's infrastructure removes these intermediaries, enabling instant settlement with predictable execution.

Polymarket recorded volume of $3.11 billion this month, its fifth consecutive monthly record, replacing QuickSwap as the leading decentralized exchange by volume on Polygon. The shift from traditional DeFi protocols to prediction markets as the dominant volume driver shows how users interact with onchain applications, and confirms that Polymarket has established Polygon as its primary settlement layer for USDC-based predictions.

Transfers of JPYC reached an all-time high of $16.8 million, indicating demand for yen-pegged assets in regional corridors where users need yen exposure without converting through USD.

Polygon currently ranks second on Coinbase’s x402 payments protocol which is used by AI labs and companies to charge for token usage, API calls, and supports AI agents making autonomous transactions. With sub-cent transaction costs, the network supports low-value transfers required for agentic commerce. Boiron sees AI as a major catalyst: "If you want AI to work at its full potential... AI is going to be leveraging blockchains for payments, period."

🟪The big picture: Polygon continues scaling its stablecoin infrastructure for real-world payment applications. USDC accounted for over 70% of total stablecoin volume this month, as more users look to stablecoins for payments, prediction markets, and agentic transactions.

The Ethereum community's development of ERC-8004, a standard for trustless agent discovery and reputation systems, could further expand agentic payment activity on Polygon, as AI agents gain standardized protocols for choosing settlement rails based on verifiable performance metrics.

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This information is for entertainment purposes only. It should not be considered financial advice, nor should it be used to make investment decisions. Cryptocurrencies are high risk and you should consult a financial professional before making any financial decisions. Make sure you do your own research.