Unlocking mainstream stablecoin adoption through education
As we head into 2025, stablecoin adoption is showing meaningful growth: Electric Capital notes that “stablecoins usage is at all-time highs,” with daily transactions equaling $81B. Outside of crypto trading, developers continue to enhance their applications with the utility of stablecoins like USDC. Analysts forecast that the total stablecoin supply will double in 2025 to exceed $400 billion, due to their increasing use in payments, remittances, and settlements. In particular, USDC’s growth has been significant: the currency has seen a 100% increase in circulation year-over-year (as of January 29, 2025), with monthly volume recently reaching $1 trillion and all-time volume now surpassing $21 trillion.
To fuel further USDC growth in 2025, Team Circle’s mission is to help devs unlock opportunities through comprehensive developer education and ecosystem building with our latest innovations, including Circle Paymaster for gasless transactions, Modular Smart Contract Accounts for advanced wallet functionality, CCTP V2 for faster cross-chain USDC transfers, and USDC Access for seamless fiat-to-USDC conversion, making it easier for developers to integrate USDC and build more robust applications.
Let’s have a look at these three Circle initiatives for this year:
1. Delivering education through digestible and engaging content:
Circle is actively creating new video content, writing blogs, developing quickstart guides, and building example apps to engage developers and provide them with the education needed to build onchain with the Circle Platform, demonstrating the power of USDC as it drives the future of payments and finance. In 2025, we will prioritize education in the following three areas:
- Payments: We demonstrate how to use our APIs to build cross-border payment systems that enable fast, secure, and cost-effective global transactions.
- Enterprise Solutions: We help developers leverage advanced tools to streamline their financial operations and enhance security. We will also help them understand compliance features to ensure regulatory adherence.
- DeFi Applications: We familiarize developers with the capabilities of smart contracts. Developers are empowered to consider using Circle's smart contracts to create automated, transparent, and efficient financial services.
2. Supporting a robust community and ecosystem:
The onchain developer community is expanding rapidly; Electric Capital notes that “established developers (those in crypto for 2+ years) are at all-time highs, growing 27% YoY and committing 70% of code commits.” Circle supports its user community by providing developers with valuable feedback, increased adoption, and collaboration opportunities, helping to foster innovation and trust. It also helps sustain projects through advocacy, open-source contributions, and ecosystem growth. Here are some of our offerings for the year:
- Community Forums and Online Groups: Active forums, Discord channels, and social media groups enable developers to share knowledge, discuss challenges, and collaborate on solutions.
- Open-Source Collaboration: Community-driven projects related to Circle APIs and USDC foster collective problem-solving and innovation.
- Developer Resources and Documentation: Community-contributed insights and best practices supplement Circle’s comprehensive guides, API documentation, and tutorials.
- Hackathons and Challenges: Circle-sponsored hackathons enable developers to showcase creative solutions, exchange ideas, and build connections within the ecosystem.
- Workshops and Webinars: Circle-hosted live and recorded sessions and community experts help developers dive deeper into technical topics and emerging use cases.
- Feedback Loops and Beta Testing: Product feedback programs allow developers to collaborate directly with Circle to shape and refine tools and features.
- Regional and Global Meetups: In-person or virtual meetups and conferences encourage developers to network, learn, and share experiences with peers in the blockchain and crypto-finance space.
3. Providing incentives that will accelerate adoption:
Circle has implemented several incentives to accelerate the adoption of its products among developers. These programs collectively support developers by providing financial resources, technical assistance, and community engagement opportunities, fostering innovation and expanding the Circle ecosystem. Current incentives include:
- Grants: This program offers grants in USDC to early-stage projects integrating USDC into their applications. Benefits include operational support, co-marketing opportunities, access to the Circle Access Network, potential referrals to Circle Ventures, and more. Applications are set to reopen in early 2025.
- Circle Credits: Designed to lower the cost of building onchain applications, this program provides credits that can be used to pay for Circle's Web3 Services, such as Smart Contract Platform API calls and Programmable Wallets monthly fees. Developers can apply for different tiers of credits based on their project's scale and needs.
- Ambassadors: This program enables developers around the world to leverage their localized expertise as they serve their community and grow their specific needs, accelerating the mainstream adoption of USDC and Circle services. Applications will open in early 2025.
In 2025, some of our most important content will come from developers and partners leveraging USDC. Our Builder Series videos feature conversations with entrepreneurs and engineers who have chosen Circle and USDC as foundations for their success. Builders can focus on innovation and customer experience as Circle’s commitment to compliance and extensive developer tooling simplify building with USDC. This ultimately leads to mainstream adoption of USDC and Circle Services, benefitting all who build on the platform. The results are real: today, USDC is natively supported on 16 blockchains, and almost 4 million wallets currently hold at least $10 USDC.
As more and more builders consider and adopt USDC as the stablecoin of choice this year, Circle will be there to support developers with new opportunities for learning, community engagement, and inspiration. Let’s get started and build on Circle, together.
