The news: PayPal will power stablecoin payouts for US creators on YouTube, per Fortune.

US creators can receive PYUSD payments instead of direct deposit.

Why this matters: The creator economy is soaring. 

• We forecast that US creator revenues will rise by 15.5% in 2025, cracking $17.76 billion. 
• And the size of the creator community is gigantic—1.5 million US adults consider themselves full-time digital content creators, per IAB’s April 2025 report. 

With YouTube leading other video platforms in terms of users (198 million) and total user minutes (11.4 billion), per our forecasts. PayPal stands to process significant volume for creator payouts in terms of scale and size in PYUSD.

PayPal isn’t alone in targeting creator payouts through crypto—Visa started facilitating stablecoin payments for creatives with Visa Direct.

Zooming out: PayPal is trying to pull younger consumers into its ecosystem. It launched the PayPal Everywhere campaign featuring Will Ferrell and enlisted White Lotus stars for the Venmo Everything marketing push. It’s also rolled out Big Ten and Big 12 partnerships aimed at college students. 

With almost half of Gen Zers identifying as “digital sidehustlers” and 13% earning side money through content creation, per a Credit Karma survey, PayPal stands to capture more of these creators within its ecosystem with PYUSD, as creators can anticipate faster payouts with the digital currency compared with alternative methods.

Our take: While PayPal’s stablecoin payments are exclusive to US creators for now, the benefits of crypto are more likely to be felt by international creatives, who could be served by lower fees and faster transaction times. If US adoption is favorable, PayPal has a viable growth plan moving forward.