Ethereum leads stablecoin market cap growth, adding $243M in a week

Stablecoin supply across Ethereum, Arbitrum One and Base rose by a combined $403.1 million over the past week. Ethereum accounted for the largest piece, at approximately $243 million.

The data comes from DefiLlama and covers a week in October 2026. No headline event appears to have triggered the move.

Where the new dollars landed

Ethereum’s stablecoin supply now sits at around $146.5 billion, according to DefiLlama figures. That makes the network the single largest home for dollar-pegged tokens tracked on-chain.

Ethereum holds about 47-48% of the total on-chain stablecoin supply across the major networks DefiLlama tracks.

The more interesting percentages came from the Layer-2 networks. Arbitrum’s stablecoin supply rose 2.08% over seven days. Base posted a 0.86% increase over the same stretch.

For readers newer to the term, Layer-2 networks are separate chains built on top of Ethereum. They process transactions more cheaply and then settle back to the main network. Arbitrum One and Base are two of the most widely used.

The tokens doing the heavy lifting

Two names dominate the supply on these chains: USDT, issued by Tether, and USDC, issued by Circle. Both are designed to hold a steady value of one US dollar.

USDT controls approximately 50% of Ethereum’s stablecoin supply on its own.

Stablecoins are the plumbing of on-chain finance. Traders park funds in them between positions. Lending protocols use them as the main asset borrowers want. Decentralized exchanges rely on them as the base currency for most trading pairs.

The bigger stablecoin picture

Zoomed out, the total stablecoin market cap has held in a range between $300 billion and $306 billion. The weekly growth on Ethereum and its Layer-2s fits within that broader stable pattern rather than breaking from it.

What this means for traders and DeFi users

Concentration risk is one thing to keep in mind. With USDT holding roughly half of Ethereum’s stablecoin supply, the network’s dollar liquidity leans heavily on one issuer. Anything that affects Tether’s operations would ripple through a large share of on-chain activity.

A single week of data is a snapshot, not a trend line. The overall stablecoin market cap staying in a tight range suggests the industry is consolidating rather than surging, and the absence of a specific news driver means this growth could just as easily slow down without warning.

The metrics to track from here are straightforward. Watch whether Ethereum’s share of on-chain stablecoin supply holds in the 47-48% range. Watch whether Arbitrum and Base keep growing faster than the main chain in percentage terms. And watch whether the total stablecoin market cap finally breaks out of its $300 billion to $306 billion range, in either direction.