USDC is a digital dollar backed 100% by highly liquid cash and cash-equivalent assets and is 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.

USDC is natively supported for 19 blockchain networks: Algorand, Aptos, Arbitrum, Avalanche, Base, Celo, Ethereum, Hedera, Linea, NEAR, Noble, OP Mainnet, Polkadot, Polygon PoS, Solana, Stellar, Sui, Unichain, and ZKsync – 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.

Individuals and everyday users, startups, and small businesses can access USDC from exchanges. Learn more on USDC.com.

‍Circle Mint -  Circle Mint enables wholesale providers such as exchanges, institutional traders, wallet providers, banks, and large financial institutions to directly redeem USDC 1:1 for USD from Circle. Circle Mint is not available to individuals.

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 18 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.

Deloitte & Touche LLP is Circle’s independent auditor and has audited Circle’s financials since fiscal 2022. Prior to Deloitte, Grant Thornton LLP served as Circle’s independent auditor from 2015.

Our view is that USDC is not a security. In April 2025, the staff of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission issued a Statement on Stablecoins (the Statement), which confirmed that as described in the Statement, the offer and sale of “Covered Stablecoins” in the manner described in the Statement does not constitute the offer and sale of securities under the Securities Act of 1933 or the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.

Our view is that USDC is a Covered Stablecoin. The Statement on Stablecoins defines “Covered Stablecoins” as those which are "designed to maintain a stable value relative to the United States Dollar, or 'USD,' on a one-for-one basis, can be redeemed for USD on a one-for-one basis (i.e., one stablecoin to one USD), and are backed by assets held in a reserve that are considered low-risk and readily liquid with a USD-value that meets or exceeds the redemption value of the stablecoins in circulation.

Our view is that USDC is a "covered stablecoin" as it is designed to maintain a stable value relative to the USD, is redeemable 1:1 for USD⁹, and is 100% backed by highly liquid cash and cash equivalent assets. Information on the reserves backing USDC is made publicly available here with monthly third-party assurances that the value of the reserves meets or exceeds the value of USDC in circulation.