- Stellar has launched USD Coin (USDC) on its network
- The announcement comes as a part of Stellar Development Foundationโs partnership with Circle
- The second-biggest stablecoin, USDC is now tradeable across all Stellar’s ecosystem
- USDC is available with six stablecoin pairs and across five tradable wallets in the Stellar ecosystem
Stellar has announced that Circleโs USD Coin (USDC), has been launched on its open-source decentralized protocol network. The integration of the USDC which is a stablecoin pegged to the US dollar was made possible by a partnership between the Stellar Development Foundation (SDF) and Circle.
The USDC was created by a joint venture comprising US crypto exchange Coinbase and payments firm Circle. The newest launch makes Stellar the third official blockchain for the USDC stablecoin. A few months ago, USD Coin was launched on the Algorand blockchain, reducing its reliance on its first network, Ethereum.
Details of the Launch
The partnership between SDF and Circle Consortium now means that the USD Coin (USDC) is now part of the Stellar ecosystem. According to the official announcement, USDC is now available across all Stellar accounts via Lobstr, Solar, Stellarport, StellarX, and Stellarterm wallets.
Sponsored
USDC is currently the second-largest stablecoin and the thirteenth-largest digital asset by market capitalization. In 2020, USDC supported on-chain transactions of over $230 billion on-chain transactions which it noted spanned diverse industries and use cases.
Acting as a safe haven from the volatility of the regular cryptos, the stablecoin now holds a market capitalization of over $6 billion (backed by USD.) Members of the Stellar ecosystem can now trade USDC across an ecosystem that has over 9,000 assets.
This will not be the first stablecoin launched in the Stellar ecosystem. In December 2020, one of the oldest German banks BVDH became a blockchain pioneer after it issued the first Euro stablecoin (EURB) on Stellar blockchain.
On the Flipside
- The founder of crypto scam, Start Options, promoted by actor Steven Seagal has been charged along with two others by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)
- Similarly, in South Africa, the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) has issued a new warning as the number of crypto-related scams rise
- The country recently witnessed a Bitcoin scam which saw some cybercriminals cart away with over $644 million
The Stellar โ Circle Partnership
n October 2020, Stellar became the official chain for the USDC. Since then, both firms have been working together. Using Circle Account and its API services, users and blockchain developers can now access the USDC via one-single integration.
Speaking on the partnership, Denelle Dixon, the CEO of Stellar Development Foundation said;
Combining our strengths โ USDC as one of the worldโs leading compliant and regulated digital dollar stablecoins and Stellar as a mature network with an unparalleled ability to connect global financial infrastructure โ we are positioned to offer USDC and Stellar users a new level of opportunity
Denelle Dixon explained that the integration of the USDC into the Stellar network will allow it to expand its global reach. Stellarโs plan with the partnership is to pursue the mission of creating new avenues for growth and innovation for the developers and businesses building on the network.