Circle co-founder, chairman and CEO Jeremy Allaire used a Q2 2026 earnings AMA on Aug. 19, 2026 to answer 11 questions spanning execution, stablecoin adoption, global payments, Circle’s long-term business model, Arc’s five-year outlook, trust primitives for AI agents, CPN, EURC and the possible impact of the CLARITY Act on USDC growth.
Opening remarks focused on strategy after the Q2 report
Allaire said Circle had just released its second-quarter earnings and had already shared a large amount of information, but wanted to open the discussion more broadly so investors and other followers of the company could ask questions directly about strategy and execution.
Execution after the IPO: faster product delivery, with cybersecurity and localization still in focus
Asked what gives him confidence in Circle’s ability to execute as the company expands across payments, Arc, capital markets and financial infrastructure, Allaire said the company is performing very well overall. He pointed to the pace of product delivery after the IPO, saying the speed at which Circle has brought new products and capabilities to market has been striking.
He tied that pace to years of cross-functional coordination inside the company. Circle is building financial infrastructure, regulated financial products and platform infrastructure products at the same time, which requires deep coordination across teams. He also stressed that Circle has not grown through explosive hiring. Headcount expansion has been deliberate and measured, with the goal of building institutional depth and preserving what he called strong institutional cohesion. Many of the leaders across the company’s core business lines and key roles have worked together for a long time, he said.
Allaire also said Circle has started using AI and agentic infrastructure deeply, first in software engineering and now across the broader organization. He has told employees that AI may be one of the most important opportunities of their careers because it acts as a capability amplifier, even a kind of superpower. The people who will be most effective, he said, are those who can coordinate both humans and AI agents while working across disciplines and functions.
Drawing on roughly 30 years in internet software platform development, Allaire said many of Circle’s product and engineering leaders also come from leading technology companies, which is why Circle has always viewed itself as a technology company. The problems it is trying to solve, he said, depend fundamentally on technical innovation.
On where Circle still needs to improve, he named cybersecurity first. Cyber risk is changing quickly, particularly in crypto, but also across technology and finance more broadly. He also highlighted global operations. Circle first built out its core markets and then expanded into major financial centers with local infrastructure, liquidity and operating capacity. Now, he said, growth opportunities are opening across dozens of emerging markets and other countries, so Circle is building stronger local capabilities in staffing, operations and infrastructure to support demand for Arc, CPN, USDC, stablecoins and other digital asset products.
Where stablecoins already solve large real-world financial problems
Allaire described stablecoins as a general-purpose digital money architecture and said their use cases already span a very wide range.
At one end of that spectrum, AI agents can pay fractions of a cent to other AI agents for reasoning, data processing and other forms of cognitive labor, transactions that the traditional financial system could not support. At the other end, large capital markets institutions are using stablecoins and USDC as working capital, collateral and parts of financial infrastructure in traditional derivatives markets. Multinational corporations are also beginning to use Circle products and stablecoins for global treasury management and internal fund transfers.
On the question of where product-market fit is already visible at scale, he listed several areas.
The first is the digital asset market itself. Stablecoins provide a reliable, globally available digital dollar that works around the clock, which makes them a natural fit for markets that operate 24/7. In that environment, stablecoins are already used for working capital, collateral, cash, trade settlement and payments. Allaire added that digital asset markets are evolving beyond Bitcoin and conventional crypto assets and will increasingly include all types of assets, including real-world assets. He said the capabilities behind 24/7 markets, digital asset tokenization and global software-based market structure are beginning to move into traditional capital markets. In his view, the convergence of traditional finance and onchain finance has started, even if it is still early.
The second large use case is digital dollar savings in emerging markets. Demand for digital dollars such as USDC is growing across many parts of the world, he said. For small and medium-sized businesses, households and even some large firms, stablecoins are starting to function as something close to a $1 bank account substitute, replacing parts of the local banking system for commerce, savings, investment and cross-border payments. Given the hundreds of millions of people already using stablecoins globally, Allaire said this is already becoming a scaled solution to a real financial problem.
The third clear use case is cross-border settlement and international payments. Stablecoins can serve as the settlement leg in cross-border transactions, and in a growing number of cases they are also the final form of money received. In that sense, USDC can be used for payments, receipts, store of value and cross-border transfer at the same time. Allaire said Circle is already seeing this through CPN. He added that many cross-border payment companies, fintech firms and banks are working with Circle to integrate USDC into their settlement capabilities, while major payment networks such as Visa and Mastercard are also adopting stablecoins for cross-border settlement.
Looking ahead, he said the agentic economy will be a very large category because stablecoins, programmable money and machine-mediated financial infrastructure are naturally suited to an AI-agent world. Stablecoins will also keep moving deeper into traditional financial markets as onchain and traditional finance continue to converge.
On retail merchant payments, Allaire said stablecoins should eventually move into that market as well. He argued they can improve merchant unit economics and create new consumer value through rewards and membership benefits, though he noted that market is still some distance from true large-scale adoption.
USDC’s main global payments opportunities: settlement, capital markets and agents
When asked where the biggest opportunities for USDC in global payments lie, Allaire named three: cross-border settlement, capital markets payments and settlement, and agentic payments.
He said AI agents live in the cloud and on the internet, and that their task execution tends to be highly deterministic. Circle is seeing that on protocols such as x402, more than 99% of agentic payments use USDC. AI agents need reliable money, a broadly accepted unit of account, fast settlement, extremely low cost and deterministic execution, he said, and USDC fits those requirements well.
Another major opening is retail payments. Allaire pointed to rapid growth in so-called stablecoin cards and said many neo-bank products are now being built on stablecoins. Users can hold wallets and stablecoins, send and receive them, deploy them into DeFi, invest in digital assets and real-world assets, and then spend those balances with merchants through traditional card networks. Circle is working with nearly all of the major companies in that segment, he said, and the growth has been strong.
He also argued that point-of-sale payments are likely to change. In many Asian and Latin American markets, QR codes are already a core payment method, so the jump from holding stablecoins in a mobile wallet to paying a merchant directly via a QR-based, instant stablecoin settlement flow is not far off. He said this shift does not necessarily require traditional card terminals, and that global payment adoption has already shown QR codes can upgrade the merchant acceptance stack on their own. Instant settlement and very low fees matter because they change the economics.
Allaire added that as stablecoins become legal electronic money in major markets, especially once the GENIUS Act takes effect in the U.S., the merchant acceptance chain should upgrade more quickly and more payment infrastructure firms should start supporting stablecoin-based payments.
Circle’s long-term model: reserve income remains powerful, but infrastructure revenue is growing too
Allaire said Circle is still operating very early in the development of this market opportunity. He put the current onchain stablecoin market at roughly $300 billion and said the onchain infrastructure that supports this new financial economy, while more than a decade in the making, is only now approaching the level of maturity needed for real institutional adoption.
He said the total addressable market, once electronic money itself and the services built on top of money are included, is far larger than what exists today. That includes capital markets, payments, money movement and financial infrastructure. To explain how early he believes the market still is, he compared the current stage of onchain finance and stablecoins to the internet in 2002: there had already been an initial wave, some excellent products and many failures, and plenty of capital had entered, but the industry was still in the front end of its development.
From that perspective, he said, stablecoins can grow from the hundreds of billions into the trillions of dollars. Circle’s task in that process is to work with distribution channels and platforms around the world and give them incentives to participate. World-class financial institutions, technology companies and fintech firms need to integrate Circle’s infrastructure, adopt it directly, earn revenue from it and reward their own users through it if USDC is going to scale beyond its current size.
That is why reserve income will remain a very strong economic engine for Circle, Allaire said. At the same time, more of that income will be distributed across the ecosystem as the network grows, with multiple participants sharing in the upside. Circle is not trying to maximize profit extraction from the existing business today, he said. Its objective is to build the ecosystem to a multi-trillion-dollar scale and integrate USDC broadly into the global financial and economic system.
At the same time, Circle is deliberately building a range of other products, platforms and services, including blockchain infrastructure transaction revenue and new partnership structures. He used CPN as a concrete example. The onchain payment network has only really been operating for about a year, he said, but growth has already been strong. Circle believes CPN can eventually charge per transaction while also adding monetizable value-added services on top of the network.
He described Arc as a new economic operating system and said Circle sees the opportunity there as something on the scale of Amazon Web Services. Arc, in his framing, is an economic cloud that can support a broad set of future applications. As AI accelerates and the number of applications expands, Arc could become a significant revenue source for the company.
His broader conclusion was that Circle expects to keep earning from reserves while expanding the scale and network effects of USDC, then build upward into the application layer and downward into the infrastructure layer, diversifying revenue across more digital assets, protocols and platforms.
Five-year view: Arc as economic operating system, USDC as money for a larger onchain economy
On the next five years for Arc and USDC, Allaire said Circle has been thinking about infrastructure for internet-native economic activity for about 13 years. When Circle was founded in 2013, one core idea was that blockchains would eventually become distributed computing networks where code, in the form of smart contracts, could coordinate economic activity directly, while records and assets of all kinds could be issued onto those networks.
At the time that sounded distant, he said, but after more than a decade of iterations the industry is entering a distinctive moment. Legal systems are beginning to prepare for the technology. The technology itself has advanced to what he described as roughly a fourth-generation stage. Governments, large financial institutions and major technology firms around the world are starting to recognize that this infrastructure could become a meaningful part of the future economy.
Allaire said blockchains should not be viewed simply as places to trade speculative crypto assets or handle payments. In his view, they are turning into operating systems, specifically distributed network operating systems built to run economically expressive applications. The role of those systems goes beyond saving and moving money. He said they will eventually carry economic activity itself.
He illustrated that by describing a company as a web of contracts: ownership structures, contracts around ownership, mechanisms for capital to enter the company, systems for paying cash flows and dividends to investors, treasury functions and all of the contracts needed to operate globally. Over time, he argued, the full machinery of corporate operation will move onchain, producing onchain corporations increasingly coordinated by software that is itself increasingly created and executed by AI.
He then made a broader forecast: operating systems for intelligence and operating systems for economic activity will gradually merge, and the next five years will be when that shift starts to become visible in a meaningful way. Companies will become more onchain and more agentic. Their interactions, transactions, contracts and back-office systems will move into that environment over time.
Circle wants many participants around the world to help build Arc, he said, whether by running infrastructure, upgrading it, governing it or earning from it. If more economic activity moves into these operating systems, then onchain money such as USDC and EURC should expand in role and scale alongside it.
Trust primitives for the agentic economy: KYA, reputation and programmable policy
Asked what the most basic trust primitive will be if AI agents can discover services autonomously and pay for them in USDC, Allaire said Circle has been spending a great deal of time on that question. He noted that the company had published a paper the previous week titled The Open Economy for Agents, which lays out what is needed for a functioning agentic economic system, what Circle Agent Stack already provides and what the company plans to build through the rest of the year.
The first requirement, he said, is Know Your Agent, or KYA. Just as Circle must know its customers, the ecosystem needs ways to confirm the identities of end users, businesses and the agents acting on their behalf. Regulated financial institutions already have to perform this kind of work, which gives Circle a starting base of capability.
In practice, he said, agent developers will also need KYA. When one agent interacts with another, or when users and businesses interact with an agent, cryptography should provide verifiable proof through assertions, attestations and verifiable identity. The goal is to show who an agent is and what authority and capabilities it has. Circle wants these functions to connect with emerging standards around agent identity and agent registries, creating an assurance layer similar in purpose to the certificate authorities that made trust on the internet possible.
The second element is reputation. Allaire said reputation is difficult because ratings inside internet platforms are easy to manipulate, as many open marketplaces and listing systems have already shown. Verifying the competence and reputation of AI agents will therefore be a major challenge. Circle is studying mechanisms that could create a durable feedback loop: agents are used, transactions settle, users and other agents interact with them, and those real behaviors generate data that supports a more credible reputation layer.
The third component is programmable policy. Allaire said Circle has already started offering products in this area. Circle Agent Wallet can already be configured with spending policies so users can control, programmatically, how much an agent can spend and whom it can transact with. Circle plans to continue expanding those features.
He added that all of these functions are central to the trust framework needed for the agentic economy, and said Circle is also involved in industry standards efforts, including with the x402 Foundation.
Personal discipline behind a long mission
In a more personal exchange, Allaire said that around 10 years ago he realized he would need to change some of his younger habits if he wanted to sustain the energy and clarity needed to lead a long, difficult mission like Circle at a high level.
He pointed to four main habits. The first is paying close attention to what he puts into his body, with strict discipline around diet and health. The second is sleep. He said he follows a stable and rigorous sleep routine and does a lot to protect both sleep duration and sleep quality. The third is mindfulness, which he also described as one of Circle’s core values. For him that includes more than meditation. It includes how people face the world, how well they listen and whether they are fully present in interactions with others.
Allaire said that practice carries some Buddhist influence and helps him avoid catastrophic thinking, where problems are continuously imagined in their worst possible form. When challenges arise, he tries to stay calm, accept what is happening and solve issues step by step. The fourth habit is physical fitness. He said he maintains an active exercise routine across different types of training, which supports both energy and mental acuity and also helps him stay connected to his family and children.
CPN expansion: more than 175 financial institutions have joined
On whether Circle has a formal partner, recommendation, ecosystem or business development structure to help expand CPN, Allaire said yes. He pointed to an application path on Circle’s website for firms that want to become CPN partners.
He also said Circle disclosed in its latest earnings report that more than 175 financial institutions have already joined CPN and connected to the network in different ways. The onboarding path depends on the type of business involved.
At the same time, Circle is increasing CPN’s extensibility so third parties can add value-added services over time. Allaire gave trade finance as one example, saying there are already cases involving credit facilities for cross-border settlement.
Circle also has a dedicated business development team focused entirely on payments and CPN, he said, with personnel across multiple regions globally. Beyond that, the company runs the broader Circle Alliance Program, which already includes thousands of companies that receive different benefits and more opportunities to connect and work with Circle.
EURC passes €400 million in circulation
When asked how Circle helped EURC reach $400 million in circulation so quickly, Allaire corrected the premise. The figure is more than €400 million, not $400 million, he said. He added that EURC is now one of the largest digital euros in the world.
Even so, he noted that the overall euro stablecoin market remains small compared with dollar stablecoins in the hundreds of billions. The full euro stablecoin market is still only around €1 billion in total market value.
Allaire said EURC’s early traction comes from several factors. First, Circle moved early and committed from the outset to launching a euro stablecoin within the European regulatory framework. The company worked with European regulators and financial institutions and built the needed infrastructure ahead of time, so when MiCA took effect EURC was ready to enter the market directly.
Second, Circle was able to use its existing partner and distribution network. USDC had already built broad distribution relationships across the ecosystem, giving EURC a base from which to expand. Many leading European exchanges support EURC, he said, and users can mint and redeem it 1:1 across various platforms.
Third, Circle partnered with leading DeFi protocols to build EURC markets, lending markets, swap activity and USDC/EURC FX tools.
As for what comes next, Allaire said both dollar stablecoins and euro stablecoins are still early, with digital euro infrastructure even earlier. He repeated his view that onchain money is better than current electronic money and legacy monetary systems, which means the role of an onchain digital euro should only grow over time. As MiCA and future regulatory updates evolve, and as Europe gradually opens more capital markets and real-world asset opportunities, demand for euro stablecoins should rise as well.
He also said programmable euro stablecoins should find more use cases in programmable money and cross-border settlement, and suggested EURC could also have opportunities in emerging markets where companies and households may want more currency diversification. Circle, he said, already has multiple efforts underway to keep increasing EURC’s role in Europe and globally.
Arc mainnet set for Sept. 16, built to hide blockchain complexity from users
On whether Arc’s biggest advantage may be that it gives consumer-facing blockchain products a user-friendly environment where crypto fades into the background, Allaire said he strongly agreed with that framing. He also confirmed that the Arc public mainnet is scheduled to launch on Sept. 16.
Arc has about five core capabilities, he said, and while AI-native and agentic applications are one of them, the same qualities that make Arc attractive to AI agents also make it easier for ordinary end users to use.
He described Arc as a stablecoin-native chain where gas fees and the fee model use USDC. That means users do not need to buy another crypto token first and do not even need to understand what gas fees are. Arc’s transaction fees are typically fractions of a cent, he said, which makes it feasible for developers to absorb those costs directly.
To explain why that matters, he compared it to Netflix running on Amazon Web Services. A Netflix customer does not see a separate AWS fee on the bill. In contrast, many blockchain applications have historically required users to understand and pay for the underlying computing network themselves, which he called an absurd experience. Users have no reason to care which compute network an application uses or what the underlying transaction and data infrastructure costs.
Arc is meant to make that layer disappear. Developers can simply take on transaction costs in the same way companies already absorb AI inference costs, AWS bills or Google Cloud costs.
Allaire said this also simplifies life for enterprise developers. Companies do not want to hold multiple digital commodities just to deploy an application, nor do they want the accounting, compliance and custody burdens that come with that model. If a business can operate the infrastructure just by holding digital dollars, the financial, legal and compliance picture becomes much simpler.
That is why one of Arc’s main design goals is to make the operating system itself invisible to the user. Whether the application is financial, governance-related or agentic, the user should focus on the app rather than the underlying stack. If blockchains are going to serve billions of people, he said, the technology underneath has to become almost completely invisible. In his words, Arc is one of the most important attempts in the history of the blockchain industry to make that possible.
Circle’s implementation focus will be on developers. As the Sept. 16 mainnet launch approaches, the company is preparing a set of supporting products designed to help developers build strong experiences quickly, safely and reliably. Allaire said security, trustworthiness, infrastructure robustness and simplicity all matter more now because the threat environment has changed.
Why Allaire thinks USDC can keep growing even without a September CLARITY vote
Asked whether USDC adoption can still keep growing if the CLARITY Act does not pass in September, Allaire’s short answer was yes.
He said stablecoins are becoming part of the legal financial system around the world, and in many jurisdictions stablecoin legislation is moving faster than broader market-structure legislation for digital assets. He cited Japan, Europe and the U.S., where the GENIUS Act has already passed.
According to Allaire, the GENIUS Act will take effect in January next year, making digital dollars such as USDC an official part of the U.S. financial system and the broader dollar financial system. He said that is a major step that should keep driving demand, growth and activity for stablecoins.
He also stressed that the CLARITY Act still matters. Circle wants other areas of the market to have clear rules as well, including trading markets, derivatives markets, tokenization and capital markets. Clear registration and regulatory structures in those areas would matter for consumer protection, market competitiveness and U.S. competitiveness, he said.
Still, he argued that stablecoin growth does not depend on CLARITY. The two tracks are complementary, but stablecoin adoption has its own growth logic.
Allaire also warned against focusing too narrowly on U.S. policy. While U.S. policy is important and has global influence, digital assets and digital currency are global by nature, and blockchain infrastructure is global computing infrastructure. Regulators around the world are putting rules in place, he said.
A large share of stablecoin adoption is already taking place outside the U.S. Circle’s opportunity spans 185 countries, and demand exists across dozens of them. In his view, a U.S.-only lens risks missing the scale of the broader trend.
He closed by saying Circle still wants to see the law passed. If it does not pass in September, Congress can continue working on it later. In the meantime, U.S. regulators have already indicated that they will use guidance and rulemaking to support a digital asset market that develops in a trustworthy, safe and compliant way. For that reason, he said, USDC can continue to grow even without a September CLARITY outcome.
Closing
Allaire thanked participants for joining the AMA and said he looked forward to continuing the conversation in coming quarters.