Polygon invests $250 million to complete its ecosystem. Can the deflationary POL token trigger the "2026 rebirth"?

Sandeep Nailwal sets 2026 as the “Rebirth Year” for POL. This commitment is not just empty talk—alongside a $250 million strategic acquisition, an aggressive technology roadmap, and the gradual entry of top global institutions, Polygon is attempting a spectacular transformation from an Ethereum “plugin” to a foundational layer for global payments and tokenization.

$250 Million Acquisition Strategy, from On-Chain to Real-World Finance

On January 13, an announcement from Polygon Labs drew industry attention: the company completed acquisitions of Coinme and Sequence, totaling over $250 million. The strategic logic behind this move is more thought-provoking than the numbers themselves.

Coinme is one of the earliest licensed Bitcoin ATM operators in the US, controlling a network of ATMs across 49 states and thousands of retail outlets, including major chains like Kroger. More importantly, this transaction secures an irreplaceable asset—an essential license system for US payment institutions, especially the Money Transfer License (MTL).

Sequence fills another piece of the puzzle—providing on-chain infrastructure services like wallets. A channel connecting real-world and on-chain assets, and a technical platform for transactions, the $250 million investment seamlessly links these two components.

The core significance of this acquisition lies in building a closed-loop for deposits and withdrawals. For users without bank accounts or wary of centralized exchanges, Polygon offers a shortcut through Coinme’s ATM network—allowing cash to be converted directly into on-chain assets (stablecoins or POL tokens) at supermarket checkout counters. This is not only a technical barrier but also a compliance barrier—Coinme, operating for over a decade, has developed a mature compliance framework, opening the door for Polygon into the real-world financial sector.

Polygon Labs CEO Marc Boiron stated that this deal is an important part of their stablecoin and payment strategy. Sandeep Nailwal explicitly said that this move will enable Polygon to compete head-to-head with Stripe. Over the past year, Stripe has also been acquiring stablecoin and crypto wallet startups, building a complete stack from payment processing to asset storage. Now, Polygon is following a similar route, aiming to stand on equal footing with traditional FinTech giants.

Performance Surge from 5,000 to 100,000 TPS, Building a Technical Moat

Payment competition depends heavily on underlying performance. Sandeep Nailwal publicly shared an ambitious technical roadmap.

Recently, Polygon completed the Madhugiri hard fork upgrade, which has shown initial results—raising on-chain TPS (transactions per second) by 40% to 1,400 TPS. This is just the first step—Polygon aims to surpass 5,000 TPS within six months, enabling blockchain throughput to handle peak global retail payment traffic.

A more aggressive second phase targets 100,000 TPS, comparable to Visa-level transaction density. This would position Polygon as a truly infrastructure capable of rivaling traditional payment networks. Achieving this depends on two key technologies:

Rio upgrade will introduce stateless validation and recursive proofs, reducing transaction finality from minutes to about 5 seconds, and eliminating chain reorganization risks.

AggLayer (Aggregation Layer) will enable seamless liquidity sharing across multiple chains through zk-proof aggregation—making 100,000 TPS not just a single chain’s load, but a distributed effort across the entire Polygon network.

In this sense, Polygon is not just transforming a single chain but building a federated system.

Penetrating Retail Payments, International Fintech Giants Join the Fray

Once the technology and channels are in place, a thriving payment ecosystem becomes inevitable. Polygon is deepening collaborations with top global FinTech companies, positioning itself as the technical backbone of a worldwide payment network.

Revolut—Europe’s largest digital bank with 65 million users—has integrated Polygon as its main infrastructure for crypto payments, staking, and trading. Revolut users can perform low-cost stablecoin transfers and stake POL tokens directly via Polygon. Recent data shows that Revolut’s cumulative transaction volume on Polygon has approached $900 million, with steady growth.

Flutterwave—a leading African payment ecosystem—also chose Polygon as its preferred public chain for cross-border payments, focusing on stablecoin settlements. Given the high costs of traditional remittances in Africa, Polygon’s low fees and fast settlement times offer a better alternative for local drivers paid via Uber and trade flows.

Mastercard has adopted Polygon to power its “Mastercard Crypto Credential” identity verification scheme, introducing verified username features for self-custody wallets, significantly lowering usage barriers, reducing address recognition risks in transfers, and optimizing overall payment experience.

These collaborations are reflected in on-chain data. According to Dune Analytics, recent transactions of small payments (single transactions of $10–$100) on Polygon have exceeded 900,000, setting a record. Onchain researcher Leon Waidmann pointed out that this transaction range closely overlaps with daily credit card spending, indicating Polygon is gradually evolving into a mainstream payment gateway and PayFi (payment finance) channel.

Institutional Tokenization Demand Explodes, Top Asset Managers Like BlackRock Enter the Fray

If payments are Polygon’s user traffic entry point, then tokenization is its foundation as an institutional-grade infrastructure.

In the RWA (Real-World Asset) distribution space, Polygon has become a testing ground and preferred platform for global asset management institutions. Its low interaction costs and seamless compatibility with the Ethereum ecosystem give Polygon a significant advantage in migrating traditional financial assets onto the chain.

In October 2025, global asset management giant BlackRock deployed about $500 million of assets on Polygon through its BUIDL tokenization fund. This move is seen as the highest-level endorsement of Polygon 2.0’s security architecture. With large-scale institutional capital inflows, Polygon’s total value locked (TVL) and liquidity depth are expected to further increase.

AlloyX’s launch of the Real Yield Token (RYT) on Polygon exemplifies the integration of traditional finance and DeFi. This fund invests in short-term, low-risk instruments like US Treasuries, supporting a cyclical leverage strategy—investors can use RYT as collateral to borrow in DeFi protocols and reinvest to amplify returns.

Germany’s NRW.BANK issued digital bonds, opening a new door. These bonds operate under Germany’s eWpG (Electronic Securities Law), demonstrating Polygon’s ability not only to issue standard crypto tokens but also to support highly regulated, compliant assets.

POL Deflationary Launch, Reigniting Token Value Capture

From MATIC to POL, it’s not just a symbol change but a redefinition of economic logic.

Since early 2026, Polygon has accumulated over $1.7 million in on-chain fees and burned more than 12.5 million POL tokens (worth about $1.75 million at current $0.14 price). Castle Labs’ analysis indicates that the fee surge mainly stems from Polymarket’s 15-minute prediction market fee feature, which has generated over $100,000 in daily revenue for Polygon.

More notably, a historical record was set: Polygon PoS burned 3 million POL in a single day, about 0.03% of the total supply. This is not accidental but a natural result of the ecosystem entering a high-frequency usage phase.

According to EIP-1559, when block utilization remains above 50% for an extended period, gas fees enter a rapid upward cycle. Currently, Polygon’s daily burn rate stabilizes around 1 million POL, with an annualized burn rate of about 3.5%. This figure is surprising, as it exceeds the annual staking reward rate of about 1.5% for POL by more than twice.

This means that, solely through on-chain activity growth, POL’s circulating supply is being physically reduced at a significant pace. Such a high-density value capture mechanism may support Sandeep Nailwal’s vision of “token rebirth.” POL’s current price is $0.14, leaving room for further upside.

Four Major Challenges, Can 2026 Truly Be the “Rebirth Year”?

Although Polygon’s current momentum looks promising, the road ahead is not without obstacles—at least four major tests:

Regulatory Double-Edged Sword—Acquiring Coinme indeed secured a compliant license, but it also exposes Polygon to close scrutiny from US state regulators. If Coinme’s compliance issues intensify, it could severely impact the “Rebirth 2026” plan.

Fragmentation of Technical Architecture—Polygon 2.0 encompasses PoS, zkEVM, AggLayer, Miden, and other complex modules. While more powerful, maintaining such a large and diverse ecosystem poses high engineering and security risks. Especially if vulnerabilities emerge in cross-chain interactions via AggLayer, systemic disasters could occur.

Intense Competition in the Public Chain Market—Base, backed by Coinbase, has gained massive user growth, encroaching on Polygon’s market share in community and payments; Solana and other high-performance L1s still lead in speed and developer experience, and Polygon’s 100,000 TPS goal needs time to verify; Arbitrum and other Layer 2s are also evolving actively.

Financial Sustainability Concerns—According to Token Terminal, Polygon posted net losses exceeding $26 million last year, with on-chain fee income unable to cover validator costs. This indicates Polygon is still in an “invest for growth” phase. Even if it turns profitable by 2026, the long-term sustainability of its revenue model remains uncertain.

Overall, Polygon no longer aims solely to be Ethereum’s “plugin.” Its transformation path is clear: expanding capacity through technological breakthroughs, lowering user entry barriers via strategic acquisitions, gaining institutional credibility, and reinforcing ecosystem stickiness through high-frequency scenarios.

As the “Rebirth Year” in 2026, success will be measured not only by POL token price fluctuations but also by Polygon’s deepening role as a global financial infrastructure. For investors, continuous tracking of Polygon 2.0’s technological implementation, institutional capital inflows, and financial performance will be key indicators of whether this “rebirth” can succeed.