Circle has officially launched the Arc mainnet, a Layer 1 blockchain designed for payments, trading, and agentic economic activity. The network went live with over 100 institutional and ecosystem partners. Founding validators include major financial institutions such as BlackRock, DTCC, Mastercard, Visa, ICE, Standard Chartered, and SBI Group.
The company completed a genesis mint of 10 billion ARC tokens this week. While this marks a significant technical milestone, Circle clarified that the mint is not a commitment to a public token launch. The project aims to transition from a proof-of-authority model to proof-of-stake by 2027. Previously, Circle raised $222 million in an ARC token presale at a $3 billion valuation.
The USDC stablecoin, which currently has approximately $74 billion in circulation, serves as the gas token for the new blockchain. The platform is designed with a permissioned validator model and a defined governance perimeter to facilitate treasury operations and confidential payments for banks. Arc also supports optional post-quantum signatures for enhanced security.
The ecosystem includes access for major banks like BNY, HSBC, Societe Generale, and State Street. Trading and lending services are anchored by platforms such as Aave, Uniswap, and Morpho, while exchanges including Binance, Kraken, and Bybit provide network access. The testnet, which ran for less than a year, processed over 700 million transactions.
