Circle shares climbed 16.7% across Aug. 19 and Aug. 20 before adding another 5.16% on Aug. 21 to close at $87.98, as a Bitcoin move above $70,000 and falling U.S. Treasury yields lifted crypto-linked equities. The rally also arrived weeks before Circle’s planned Sept. 16 public-mainnet launch for Arc, a blockchain intended to bring stablecoin settlement and tokenized financial assets onto proprietary infrastructure.
The shares gained 9.56% to $78.59 on Aug. 19 and a further 6.45% to $83.66 on Aug. 20. The price action placed Circle among the more responsive publicly traded companies tied to digital-asset activity, although its underlying earnings profile remains closely tied to interest rates rather than cryptocurrency trading volumes.
Circle’s second-quarter results, released Aug. 5, show the tension in that model. Total revenue and reserve income rose 7% from a year earlier to $701 million, while adjusted EBITDA increased 8% to $143 million. Net income from continuing operations came in at $48 million.
More than 85% of Circle’s revenue came from interest income on the reserves backing USDC, according to the company’s quarterly results. Those reserves are primarily held in short-term U.S. Treasuries and cash-like instruments, making Circle highly sensitive to changes in short-term rates.
The company reported that its reserve yield declined to 3.48% in the second quarter from 4.14% a year earlier. Lower Treasury yields can reduce revenue even when the amount of USDC in circulation grows, placing greater pressure on Circle to build fee-generating products beyond reserve management.
USDC usage expands faster than revenue
USDC ended the second quarter with $73.3 billion in circulation, up 19% year over year, Circle said. Average USDC in circulation during the period was $76.5 billion, while on-chain transaction volume associated with the stablecoin reached $14.8 trillion, a 151% increase from a year earlier.
The difference between transaction growth and revenue growth illustrates Circle’s commercial challenge. USDC can move across blockchains at much higher volumes without producing directly comparable revenue for Circle, particularly when activity occurs on networks and applications operated by third parties.
Arc is designed to give Circle a greater role in that infrastructure. The network is being positioned as a stablecoin-native blockchain where institutions can settle payments, use tokenized funds and securities, and build financial applications with USDC at the center.
Circle has scheduled Arc’s public mainnet launch for Sept. 16. The company has listed more than 100 institutions and ecosystem projects as participants, including initial validators BlackRock, DTCC, Visa, Mastercard, Intercontinental Exchange, Standard Chartered and MoneyGram.
Validator participation does not necessarily mean each organization will immediately move major transaction flows onto Arc. It does give the network a more institutional starting point than a typical public-chain launch, especially if planned tokenization and settlement pilots progress into commercial products.
BlackRock is expected to deploy BUIDL, its tokenized money market fund, on Arc. DTCC is planned to explore tokenizing custodial securities and connecting them to the network. Those projects would test whether Arc can support regulated financial assets alongside stablecoin transfers rather than functioning only as another venue for on-chain trading.
Arc presales lift Circle’s revenue outlook
Circle completed $242 million in Arc token presales during the second quarter, with revenue recognition tied to product milestones, according to the company. Following those sales, Circle raised its 2026 “other revenue” outlook to between $310 million and $330 million, from a prior range of $150 million to $170 million.
The company also increased its RLDC margin guidance to 41.7% to 43.7%, from 38% to 40%. The revised outlook indicates that Circle expects Arc-related products to begin contributing meaningfully to revenue, though milestone-based recognition means reported results may not move in a straight line.
Circle Payments Network, another part of the company’s effort to build non-reserve revenue, reported annualized payment volume of roughly $15 billion at the end of June and $23 billion by the end of July. Circle expects commercialization of the network to begin in the second half of 2026.
Payments-network volume is an early measure of activity, rather than a direct indicator of near-term revenue. Commercial terms, take rates, customer retention, and the share of transactions that remain on Circle-operated systems will determine whether volume develops into a durable fee business.
Patent deal broadens the company’s infrastructure portfolio
On July 27, Circle acquired IBM blockchain patent assets spanning more than 680 patent families and nearly 1,000 granted patents, according to Circle. The assets cover blockchain systems, banking and insurance applications, enterprise infrastructure, and secure cloud services.
The acquisition gives Circle a wider intellectual-property portfolio as it moves into institutional blockchain infrastructure. Patent holdings alone do not establish product demand, but they could strengthen Circle’s position in enterprise negotiations and reduce reliance on technology developed entirely outside the company.
A long-range valuation model published by TIKR projected a neutral-case 2030 year-end value of about $259 per Circle share when the stock traded at $83.66. The model assumed USDC could compound at roughly 40% over a full market cycle, the stablecoin market could expand to between $1 trillion and $4 trillion by 2030, and Arc and Circle Payments Network could generate a growing share of non-reserve revenue.
That estimate depends on several assumptions that are central to Circle’s next phase: sustained USDC growth, institutional use of Arc, and a larger portion of stablecoin activity remaining on Circle-linked infrastructure. The average Wall Street target price referenced alongside the model was about $101, reflecting a much shorter-term view and a more conventional focus on earnings execution.
Circle’s Sept. 16 Arc launch will give traders a clearer operating test of the company’s strategy. The most useful early markers will be whether institutional partners deploy real products, whether tokenized assets and payment flows remain active after launch, and whether those services begin reducing Circle’s dependence on Treasury yields.
With Circle’s stock jumping on Bitcoin’s surge, explore detailed BTC outlooks in our Bitcoin price analysis guide.
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