Stablecoins let people hold dollars in their wallets without intermediaries. But until now, spending those dollars with a card meant handing them over to the card issuer first - and hoping they'd be returned. Karta removes that step: funds stay with the user, and the card works like any Visa.

WILMINGTON, NC / ACCESS Newswire / May 12, 2026 / Karta - one wallet for every payment, anywhere - with 25,000+ active cardholders monthly, today announces its integration with Tempo, a blockchain network built specifically for payments. Starting May 2026, every Karta Personal card transaction will be reconciled on the Tempo blockchain in under one second, with funds remaining in the user's wallet at all times.

What this means for the user

Karta gives users a single app with a Visa card issued by Rain. Here's how it works: the user holds stablecoins in their own wallet. At the moment of purchase - online or in-store - funds are debited directly from that wallet. No need to pre-load a card or transfer money to someone else's balance sheet. The merchant gets paid through Visa as usual, and the transaction is recorded on the Tempo blockchain in under one second. Money leaves the wallet only when the user decides to spend.

Today, more than 25,000 monthly cardholders and 1,250+ business teams use Karta. In the hand, it feels like a modern fintech. Under the hood, every transaction is reconciled on-chain on Tempo. Karta orchestrates, partners, executes, money moves - but never through Karta's balance sheet.

Who Karta is built for

Karta's users aren't defined by geography - they're defined by behavior. Freelancers paid by clients overseas. Remote employees on foreign payroll. Creators on international platforms. Crypto contributors earn in stablecoins. Families sending money home across borders. The common thread: their money has to work across countries, at consumer scale, without friction.

Karta's business segment serves 1,250+ teams - agencies, marketing shops, and freelancer-heavy operations - for team card management, partner payouts, and treasury.

Built for payments from day one

Building a consumer-grade self-custody card at scale requires solving several hard problems at once: settlement speed, gas costs, signing flows, and blockspace guarantees. Solving them one at a time, on different chains with different retrofits, doesn't produce a product that works for everyday users.

Karta's partner stack already included Privy for self-custody wallets and Bridge for rails and virtual accounts. The Visa card is issued by Rain, a Visa Principal Member. Tempo adds the missing piece: a settlement layer built for card payments. Not a general-purpose blockchain with payments bolted on top, but a network where speed, cost, and authorization model are designed from the ground up so that a card can debit funds from a user's wallet at the moment of purchase - with no delays and no intermediaries.

Settlement on Tempo finalizes in under 500 milliseconds - fast enough for real-time card authorization. Gas is denominated in stablecoins natively, so users never need a separate token. Tempo's Access Keys allow authorized debits from a user's wallet without transferring custody and without requiring a live signature at the moment of purchase - this is what makes self-custody compatible with card networks. And dedicated payment lanes guarantee Karta's throughput regardless of other activity on the network.

From the cardholder's perspective, nothing changes. The card works the way any Visa card works. The difference is structural: the user actually owns the funds, and every transaction is verified on-chain.

"At Karta, self-custody isn't a feature - it's the architecture. Every user holds their own stablecoin balance in their own wallet, and every transaction they make is reconciled on-chain. Doing that at consumer scale was only possible on infrastructure built for payments, not retrofitted for them. Tempo is the first chain where we didn't have to trade self-custody for a product that actually works."

- Nik Zimarkov, Co-founder & CEO, Karta

Where Karta is today and what's next

Since its launch, Karta has grown to over 25,000 monthly cardholders, with a Visa card accepted in more than 150 countries, and supports over 1,250 business teams on the platform. Treasury operations are now running on the Tempo mainnet.

In May 2026, Karta Personal moves to full on-chain reconciliation on Tempo. In the same month, fiat virtual account coverage expands from the US to 30+ countries. The business platform will migrate onto the same layer shortly after, giving both product lines a single on-chain foundation.

About Karta

One wallet for every payment, anywhere. For people who live, work, and spend globally. The product includes a Visa card - issued by Rain, a Visa Principal Member - accepted in 150+ countries, fiat virtual accounts, and on-chain reconciliation on the Tempo blockchain. The architecture is built on Privy-powered embedded wallets and MPC technology: users retain full control of their funds. Karta is available on Telegram, with iOS and Android launches planned for 2026. Learn more at karta.io.

Media contact:

Maksim Rokach CMO, Karta
max@karta.io
+62 87776630602

SOURCE: Karta