Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire on 108% USDC growth, $9.6T on-chain activity, and the Arc Layer-1 blockchain launch
Nov 12, 2025 with Jeremy Allaire
Key Points
- Circle's USDC stablecoin grew 108% year over year while on-chain transaction volume surged 600% to $9.6 trillion, signaling institutional adoption beyond retail speculation.
- Circle launched Arc, a Layer-1 blockchain designed for regulated financial activity, backed by over 100 institutional partners including Visa, Mastercard, and major banks.
- Circle now operates at both the application and infrastructure layers of on-chain finance, positioning USDC and Arc as a native financial stack for enterprises avoiding permissionless public chains.
Summary
Circle's stablecoin business is scaling rapidly. USDC grew 108% year over year, while on-chain transaction volume processed in USDC surged 600% year over year to $9.6 trillion, a figure that signals institutional-grade adoption rather than speculative retail activity.
Circle is now moving beyond stablecoin infrastructure into base-layer blockchain development. The company has launched Arc into testnet, a proprietary Layer-1 blockchain network built specifically to support regulated financial activity at scale.
The Arc buildout has attracted significant institutional backing. Over 100 major organisations collaborated with Circle on the network, including major banks, payment operators Visa and Mastercard, and unnamed large AI companies. That coalition suggests Arc is being positioned as a compliance-friendly settlement layer for enterprises that have been reluctant to build on permissionless public chains.
Jeremy Allaire, Circle's CEO, frames Arc as a natural extension of the company's core thesis that financial infrastructure should run natively on the internet. The combination of USDC's growth trajectory and Arc's institutional partner base gives Circle a credible claim to operating at both the application and infrastructure layers of on-chain finance simultaneously.