Circle

Blockchain Infrastructure · Stablecoins · Fintech

Launch

Circle launches Arc, a Layer 1 blockchain for institutional finance

Its validator lineup reads like a roster of global finance, blurring the line between public blockchains and bank-grade settlement rails.

• Circle launched the public mainnet of Arc on September 16, 2026, an open Layer 1 blockchain built for financial markets, real-time money movement and agentic economic activity, going live with more than 100 institutional and ecosystem builders.
• Circle is the issuer of USDC, the world's largest regulated dollar stablecoin with more than $74 billion in circulation, and Arc is natively integrated into its full-stack platform including CCTP, Gateway and StableFX.
• Eleven institutions validate the network alongside Circle, including BlackRock, DTCC, Visa, Mastercard, ICE, MoneyGram and Standard Chartered, under a permissioned proof-of-authority model where deployment stays open to all developers.
• USDC serves as the native gas token so fees are paid in dollars rather than a volatile crypto asset, with block times near 506 milliseconds and deterministic sub-second finality on chain ID 5042.
• Circle minted the full 10 billion ARC token supply this week as a technical genesis step, but stressed it does not signal a public token launch; Arc's testnet, live since October 2025, has already processed over 700 million transactions.
• The launch came one day after the US Senate failed to advance the CLARITY Act, leaving crypto market-structure rules unresolved even as Circle pushes deeper into regulated financial infrastructure.
• Arc marks Circle's shift from being a stablecoin issuer to operating the settlement layer itself, wagering that banks and asset managers will trust a permissioned chain over open, permissionless networks for tokenized finance and AI-driven payments.