USDC | Digital dollars backed 1:1 with USD

Why businesses choose USDC

USDC works seamlessly across applications and platforms around the globe, using blockchain infrastructure that’s faster, less expensive, and more customizable than legacy rails.

Stable & regulated

USDC is regulated and fully reserved. Reserves are transparently held at regulated financial institutions with published monthly attestations.

Unregulated, non-transparent stablecoins take risk with their reserves and do not legally separate them for the benefit of stablecoin holders.

Instant settlement

USDC transactions can settle in seconds worldwide. All day, every day.

Legacy payments can take multiple days to settle and don’t move after hours, on weekends, or during holidays.

Near-zero cost

Global payments can be made for less than a cent, so it’s affordable to send USDC.

Traditional payments pass through multiple intermediaries, introducing additional cost that’s passed on to the sender.

Open, global access

Any business or person with an internet connection and digital wallet can send and receive USDC.

Senders and receivers typically need bank accounts and specific apps or platforms to transact.

Widely used

USDC is readily available on popular exchanges and protocols, and thousands developers are building with USDC.

Many private stablecoins are only usable within certain financial products, providing less utility.

Dollar stability & global reach

USDC enables businesses to offer payment connectivity and dollar-backed financial services to more people in more places.

Access
Pay
Settle
Trade
Build

Provide access to US dollars in emerging markets

USDC provides a stable store of value, especially in countries combating currency devaluation.

Deliver low-cost cross-border payments

USDC enables businesses to reach more countries at a fraction of the cost compared to traditional cross-border payments.

Provide 24/7 payment settlement to merchants

As a PSP, it’s easy to embed USDC and make near-instant settlement available 24/7/365. Businesses who use digital assets often prefer to settle in USDC.

Use digital dollars for responsible digital asset trading

USDC is available for trading on dozens of exchanges. Market makers can provide liquidity to global capital markets with a trusted, regulated digital dollar.

Build apps for new, innovative financial services

USDC is programmable money, enabling developers to construct fund flows that adjust dynamically based on preset logic for greater efficiency and security.

How to start using USDC

Businesses
Developers
Individuals

Get USDC for your business

Circle Mint allows businesses to convert USD into USDC and vice versa, near-instantly with no fees. Today, Circle Mint is for enterprise businesses and wholesale distributors of USDC.

Learn more

Integrate USDC into an app

Integrate USDC into existing apps or use it to build new Web3 experiences using robust APIs and SDKs. Available on Avalanche, Ethereum, and many more chains.

Get the Quickstart Guide

Get USDC for personal use

Access USDC and easily convert between USDC and local currency.

Find an exchange

A global network of partners using USDC

USDC is available natively on 15+ blockchains

Fortifying trust with transparency

Circle stablecoin reserve composition and monthly attestations are publicly available, so you always know USDC is redeemable 1:1 for US dollars. USDC reserves are held in the management and custody of leading financial institutions and designed to provide holders with ready liquidity.

View Reserves

$24.4B

USDC in Circulation

as of November 30, 2023

$24.6B

USDC Reserves*

as of November 30, 2023

See disclosures

FAQs

USDC is a digital dollar backed 100% by highly liquid cash and cash-equivalent assets and is always redeemable 1:1 for US dollars. The majority of the USDC reserve is invested in the Circle Reserve Fund (USDXX), an SEC-registered 2a-7 government money market fund. Daily, independent, third-party reporting on the portfolio is publicly available via BlackRock.

Learn more about our approach to transparency.

Circle Mint enables liquidity providers and qualified businesses to redeem USDC 1:1 for USD.

Everyday users can use digital wallets and exchanges to convert between USDC and local currency.

USDC is natively accessible for 15 blockchain networks: Algorand, Arbitrum, Avalanche, Base, Ethereum, Flow, Hedera, NEAR, Noble, OP Mainnet, Polkadot, Polygon PoS, Solana, Stellar, and TRON – with more expected in the future.

USDC has also been bridged to many emerging blockchains by third-party bridges, resulting in the creation of bridged forms of USDC such as USDC.e.

For more details, see our developer docs.

Businesses can apply for a Circle Mint account to exchange US dollars for USDC. When a business deposits USD into their Circle Account, Circle issues the equivalent amount of USDC to the business. The process of issuing new USDC is known as “minting.” This process creates new USDC in circulation.

Similarly, when a business wants to exchange their USDC for US dollars, the business can deposit USDC into their Circle Mint account and request to receive US dollars. This process of redeeming USDC is known as “burning.” This process takes USDC out of circulation.

When US dollars are swapped for USDC on a digital asset exchange, the exchange will typically provide the balance of USDC it has on-hand to fulfill the swap. If the exchange needs more USDC to fulfill the swap, the exchange will often use its Circle Mint account to mint more USDC.

USDC is a fully reserved stablecoin, which is a type of cryptocurrency, or digital dollar. Unlike other cryptocurrencies that fluctuate in price, USDC is designed to maintain price equivalence to the US dollar. USDC is a stable store of value that benefits from the speed and security of blockchain technology.

USDC is issued by Circle, a company in the private sector, while a CBDC would be issued by a government. While most CBDCs are only in the research phase, USDC exists today and is widely used by millions of people around the world. Circle has developed the technology to enable USDC to run on 15 public blockchain networks, with open-source and private market innovation driving rapid progress in dollar digital currency models.

Read more about Circle’s insights on the Federal Reserve’s CBDC discussion.

Fully backed digital dollars