USDC

USDC is issued by Circle, a company that files reports with the US SEC. Deloitte has audited Circle's financial statements since fiscal 2022. In its Q2 2026 results Circle said it had received final approval from the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to set up a national trust bank, Circle National Trust. In the EU, Circle obtained an e-money licence in France in July 2024 and issues USDC under MiCA rules. Circle is also building its own blockchain, Arc, with public mainnet set for 16 September 2026; the launch itself was not checked. The issuer remains a single company that can upgrade the token contract.

• Circle: USDC Transparency & Stability
• Circle Reports Second Quarter 2026 Results (Form 8-K, exhibit 99.1)
• Circle is first global stablecoin issuer to obtain a MiCA licence
• Blockscout (Ethereum): USDC token contract

USDC has no investors in the usual sense: holders have a claim to redeem 1 USDC for US$1 and no right to income on the reserves. The key institutional link is Coinbase. Under the collaboration agreement in Circle's FY2025 10-K, Coinbase receives half of the remaining income from USDC circulating in the wider ecosystem, and in August 2026 the partnership renewed automatically on the same terms. BlackRock manages the fund that holds most reserves and BNY holds its assets in custody. Data on who holds USDC itself is insufficient in the verified facts.

• Circle Internet Group, Inc. Form 10-K for fiscal year 2025
• Coinbase keeps Circle partnership terms unchanged as USDC renewal kicks in
• Circle: USDC Terms

USDC is minted when dollars come in and destroyed when they are redeemed, so supply follows demand: US$75.3B at the end of 2025, US$73.3B at 30 June 2026 and about US$75.32B on 27 September 2026. At 30 June 2026 US$61.9B of reserves sat in the Circle Reserve Fund, an SEC-registered government money market fund managed by BlackRock that holds cash, short-dated US Treasuries and overnight Treasury repo. The rest is cash, mostly at a few of the largest banks. A Big Four firm gives monthly assurance that reserves exceed USDC in circulation. Circle keeps the reserve income: about 95% of its Q2 2026 revenue.

• Circle Internet Group, Inc. Form 10-Q for the quarter ended 30 June 2026
• Circle Reports 4th Quarter & Fiscal Year 2025 Financial Results
• DefiLlama Stablecoins API
• Circle: USDC Transparency & Stability
• Circle Reports Second Quarter 2026 Results (Form 8-K, exhibit 99.1)

USDC is the second-largest dollar stablecoin, about 24.1% of the total on 27 September 2026. Circle reported US$14.8T of on-chain USDC transaction volume in Q2 2026, up 151% year on year. It circulates widely: CoinGecko listed contracts on 36 platforms, and the largest balances were on Ethereum (US$46.65B), Hyperliquid (US$7.56B) and Solana (US$7.28B). The peg held tightly over the past year, with daily prices between US$0.9987 and US$1.0024. The last major break was in March 2023, when US$3.3B of reserves was stuck at Silicon Valley Bank and USDC fell to US$0.87 before recovering within days.

• DefiLlama Stablecoins API
• CoinGecko API: USDC (usd-coin)
• CoinGecko API: USDC market chart, 365 days
• Crypto market reaction to Silicon Valley Bank and USDC depeg (Chainalysis)