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Circle raised $222 million in a presale of the native token for Arc, its new public blockchain, valuing the network at $3 billion on a fully diluted basis, the company said Sunday.
Andreessen Horowitz led the raise with a $75 million investment, according to CNBC. Other investors include BlackRock, Apollo Funds, Intercontinental Exchange, SBI Group, Janus Henderson Investors, Standard Chartered Ventures, General Catalyst, Marshall Wace, ARK Invest, IDG Capital, Haun Ventures, and Bullish.
Institutional finance is the target market for Arc, which Circle has built as a public blockchain. Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire described it as an operating system for economic activity that goes beyond stablecoins and payments. "We're becoming a broader internet platform company," Allaire told CNBC. "We're entering the operating system business and we're doing it by building this multi-stakeholder distributed model with a token, with a distributed network."
The token supply at launch will total 10 billion, with Circle claiming a 25% stake that entitles it to run validator nodes, collect fees, and receive staking rewards. Sixty percent is earmarked for the broader ecosystem — developers, users, and others who contribute to the network — while the final 15% is set aside in a long-term reserve, according to CNBC.
Allaire framed Arc as a response to the rise of AI-driven economic activity. "We're entering this era where software machines will power the economic system," he told CNBC. "Software will do most of the work — that is what AI agents represent." Circle also announced a set of tools for developers building AI agents that can manage transactions and make payments using USDC.
No publicly listed company had previously run a token presale, making Circle a first in that regard, according to CNBC. Such raises — historically known as initial coin offerings, or ICOs — give companies a way to fund development and cultivate a user base ahead of a network's debut. The format surged to notoriety during the 2017 crypto frenzy and has since regained momentum as the Trump administration has taken a friendlier stance toward digital assets.
Circle also reported first-quarter results on Sunday. Total revenue and reserve income reached $694 million in the quarter, up 20% from a year earlier. USDC in circulation stood at $77 billion at the end of the quarter, up 28%, while USDC onchain transaction volume reached $21.5 trillion, up 263%. Net income from continuing operations was $55 million, down 15% year over year.