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Shares in Circle Internet climbed 168 per cent on its debut in New York on Thursday, offering a boost to the US market for initial public offerings and marking what the stablecoin operator called “a major step in acceptance” for its business.
The US group listed at $31 a share on the New York Stock Exchange, raising $1.1bn, increasing both the number of shares on offer and their price in response to strong investor demand. Trading in the stock was halted for volatility three times as the shares surged as high as $103.75. Circle’s shares ultimately closed at $83.23 giving the group a fully diluted market capitalisation of almost $22bn.
Its listing is one of the largest in the US this year and raises hopes that the market is beginning to thaw after President Donald Trump’s aggressive tariff policy in April forced some companies to pause their floats. Mobile banking network Chime Financial and Swedish “buy now, pay later” lender Klarna are among companies with plans to list in New York.
Circle is aiming to ride a wave of enthusiasm for digital currencies after the return of Trump to the White House. The president promised lighter-touch regulation and the promotion of digital assets as part of his administration’s policy in a bid to make the US “the crypto capital of the planet”.
Washington is close to agreeing its first regulations for stablecoins, a type of digital money that tracks the value of the dollar and is backed by reserves such as US Treasuries.
Analysts have forecast US rules could swell the global market from $250bn in circulation to about $2tn in the coming years, drawing in banks and other financial institutions. There are $61bn of Circle’s USDC in circulation, putting it behind market leader El Salvador-based Tether.
“It’s a major milestone for Circle,” said Jeremy Allaire, chief executive. “Becoming a US-listed, SEC-supervised company is a major step in acceptance. The fact that [policymakers are] understanding that the scale, not just that this has reached, but the potential of this to be into many trillions of dollars of stablecoin money in coming years is the right focus now.”
About 80 per cent of crypto trades involve stablecoins but they are increasingly being used in emerging markets as an alternative to banks for cross-border payments or as a store of value.
However, blockchain analysis group Chainalysis has also estimated that the tokens accounted for 63 per cent of the $51bn of illicit transactions last year that used cryptocurrencies.
Filings showed that Circle earned $1.66bn last year from the US Treasuries it holds to back its stablecoin. The reserves are held in a money-market fund run by BlackRock, and benefited from US interest rates of 5 per cent or more for most of last year as the Federal Reserve sought to fight inflation.
However, it paid out 60 per cent of its turnover in fees and transaction costs to incentivise companies such as crypto exchange Coinbase to use and distribute USDC.
Allaire said he was confident Circle could fend off competition from banks and other payment providers because of the scale and network it had built around the world, and the regulatory licences it had secured.
The company also recovered from a shock in 2023 when it emerged as the largest creditor in failed Silicon Valley Bank. Circle had $3.3bn of its reserves trapped in the bank, triggering a fall in the value of USDC against the dollar, until US regulators moved to ensure the deposits at SVB were safe.
Circle tried to go public in 2021 in a planned merger with a special purpose acquisition vehicle chaired by former Barclays chief Bob Diamond. A deal would have valued it at between $7bn and $9bn.
