Cash has always been the grease of capitalism, shuffling quietly from buyer to seller so the real business can get done. In crypto, something still has to play that crucial but unglamorous role, and that something is the stablecoin. Without a trustworthy on-chain dollar to use as a medium of exchange, every trade would involve swapping in and out of volatile tokens that often experience 10% moves in a day.
Yet the headlines that push stablecoins into the spotlight tend to trumpet new regulations, billion-dollar market caps, fresh exchange listings, and — occasionally — dramatic deviation from their intended fixed value (de-pegging) that leaves destruction in its wake. That can make them look like the next hot trade rather than the digital equivalent of the crumpled bills in a supermarket till.
To decide whether they belong in your portfolio at all, it pays to separate their utilitarian purpose from their real but frequently misunderstood risks.