Stock surges 11% following Q2 financial report highlighting a significant revenue jump and the launch of a new L1 blockchain platform from Circle.
Circle Announces Upcoming Arc Blockchain for Stablecoin Finance
Circle, the digital currency company behind the popular dollar-pegged stablecoin USDC, has announced plans to launch its own layer-1 blockchain, Arc, in the fall. The new blockchain is designed to optimize stablecoin finance, particularly for USDC-based transactions and financial services.
The key feature of Arc is the use of USDC as the native gas token, providing low-cost, predictable, dollar-denominated transaction fees. This design choice targets stable and enterprise-friendly payments, currency exchange, and capital markets use cases.
Arc boasts several other features to enhance its appeal to developers and enterprises. It will be EVM-compatible, allowing developers to use familiar Ethereum tools and languages to build and deploy applications. The blockchain also supports high transaction throughput and instant finality, with up to 3,000 transactions per second and transaction finality in under one second.
Arc includes integrated institutional-grade features, such as a built-in stablecoin foreign exchange engine for on-chain price discovery and 24/7 peer-to-peer settlement. This aids streamlined currency swaps and institutional trading. Users and enterprises can also choose optional privacy settings to shield transaction amounts while keeping addresses visible to meet compliance and privacy needs.
Arc will fully integrate with Circle's ecosystem, supporting not only USDC but also other Circle products like the Circle Payments Network and various stablecoins. It will remain interoperable with existing blockchains that support USDC.
The upcoming Arc blockchain is positioned as the home for builders innovating with digital money and tokenized value on the internet. It aims to radically transform stablecoin payments and financial services by merging the reliability and usability of USDC as the native gas token with enterprise-ready features, high throughput, fast finality, and developer-friendly EVM compatibility.
Circle's Q2 earnings report, published Tuesday, showed a quarterly net loss of $482 million, primarily due to $424 million spent in stock-based compensation related to vesting conditions met by the IPO, and another $167 million in losses due to an increase in the fair value of Circle's convertible debt. Despite the loss, the company reported a 53% increase in total revenue and reserve income for Q2, reaching $658 million.
The growth was primarily driven by a 90% year-over-year increase in the circulation of Circle's stablecoin, USDC. As of writing, there is over $65.6 billion worth of USDC in global circulation. Circle, as the largest stablecoin issuer based in the U.S., is one of the chief beneficiaries of the recently signed GENIUS Act, which creates a formal framework for stablecoin issuance and trading in the United States.
Circle's stock, CRCL, surged over 11.4% in pre-market trading Tuesday, following the earnings report. The IPO was a success, outperforming Wall Street expectations four times over and raising over $1 billion. The stock price eclipsed $179 early Tuesday, up from $161.17 on Monday.
Launch partners like Fireblocks will provide direct institutional access from day one, highlighting Arc's focus on enterprise and regulated institutional participants in stablecoin finance. A public testnet is expected to launch in autumn 2025, with a full public launch expected by the end of 2025.
[1] Circle. (2025). Arc: A New Layer-1 Blockchain. Retrieved from https://circle.com/arc
[2] Circle. (2025). Arc Technical Whitepaper. Retrieved from https://circle.com/arc/whitepaper
[3] Circle. (2025). Arc Developer Documentation. Retrieved from https://circle.com/arc/docs
[4] Circle. (2025). Arc Partnerships. Retrieved from https://circle.com/arc/partners
[5] Circle. (2025). Arc Roadmap. Retrieved from https://circle.com/arc/roadmap
- Circle's new blockchain, Arc, scheduled to launch in the fall, aims to optimize stablecoin finance, particularly for USDC-based transactions and financial services.
- Arc, Circle's upcoming layer-1 blockchain, will use USDC as the native gas token, providing low-cost, predictable, and dollar-denominated transaction fees.
- Arc boasts several features to enhance its appeal to developers and enterprises, including EVM-compatibility, high transaction throughput, instant finality, and integrated institutional-grade features.
- The Arc blockchain will fully integrate with Circle's ecosystem, supporting not only USDC but also other Circle products like the Circle Payments Network and various stablecoins.
- The upcoming Arc blockchain is positioned as a home for builders innovating with digital money and tokenized value, aiming to transform stablecoin payments and financial services.
- Launch partners like Fireblocks will provide direct institutional access from day one, highlighting Arc's focus on enterprise and regulated institutional participants in stablecoin finance.
