{"slug": "circle-launches-arc-mainnet-with-blackrock-dtcc-and-visa-as-validators", "title": "Circle Launches Arc Mainnet With BlackRock, DTCC and Visa as Validators", "summary": "Circle launched the Arc Layer 1 mainnet on Wednesday with more than 100 institutional and ecosystem partners, including founding validators BlackRock, DTCC, ICE, Mastercard, Visa, Standard Chartered and SBI Group. Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire called Arc \"the single most significant launch in Circle's history since USDC itself,\" and the company completed a genesis mint of 10 billion ARC tokens this week while stating the mint is not a commitment to publicly launch ARC. Circle had previously raised $222 million in an Arc token presale at a $3 billion valuation, and its testnet processed more than 700 million transactions in under a year.", "body_md": "#### In brief\n\n- Circle’s Arc mainnet went live Wednesday with more than 100 institutional and ecosystem partners on day one.\n- Founding validators include BlackRock, DTCC, ICE, Mastercard, Visa, Standard Chartered and SBI Group.\n- Circle minted 10 billion ARC tokens this week, while saying that is not a commitment to launch one publicly.\n\nCircle has switched on Arc, a Layer 1 blockchain built for payments, trading and “agentic economic activity,” [announcing](https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260916108863/en/Circle-Launches-Arc-Mainnet-an-Economic-Operating-System-for-the-Internet) the public mainnet on Wednesday.\n\nChief executive Jeremy Allaire called it \"the single most significant launch in Circle's history since USDC itself,\" in a press release. The USDC [stablecoin](https://decrypt.co/?post_type=post&p=5761) now has [around $74 billion](https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/usdc) in circulation and is wired into the new chain as its gas token.\n\nBlackRock, the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation, ICE, Mastercard, MoneyGram, SBI Group, Standard Chartered, Sumitomo, Visa, Worldpay and Galaxy make up Arc’s founding cohort. Circle presents its permissioned validator model as a selling point, pairing it with a \"defined governance perimeter\" it says lets banks use a public chain for treasury, trading and confidential payments.\n\n## ARC’s genesis mint\n\nCircle [completed](https://www.arc.io/blog/arc-economic-os-internet) the genesis mint of ARC this week, creating all 10 billion tokens and making it the first publicly traded company to mint a network token for a new Layer 1. The mint \"is not a commitment to publicly launch ARC,\" the company said, describing it instead as a technical step toward a possible move from proof of authority to proof of stake in 2027.\n\nCircle had already [raised](https://decrypt.co/367386/circle-raises-222m-in-arc-token-presale-at-3b-valuation) $222 million in an Arc token presale at a $3 billion valuation.\n\nBNY, HSBC, Societe Generale and State Street are among the banks with access; Aave and Morpho anchor lending; Uniswap, Aero and fomo provide trading; and Binance, Kraken, Bybit and OKX offer routes in, with Coinbase to follow. BlackRock's BUIDL and Circle's USYC give the markets tokenized collateral.\n\nUSDC accounts for 98.8% of agent-driven transaction volume, Circle said, citing Dune, and Arc ships with agent wallets, spending limits and nanopayments.\n\nArc [supports](https://decrypt.co/363395/circle-arc-network-quantum-resistance-bitcoin-ethereum-face-threat) optional post-quantum signatures, with broader protections in development. Circle says its testnet, which [launched](https://decrypt.co/346370/circle-arc-testnet-blackrock-visa-aws) last year with BlackRock and Visa among the participants, processed more than 700 million transactions in under a year.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/circle-launches-arc-mainnet-with-blackrock-dtcc-and-visa-as-validators", "canonical_source": "https://decrypt.co/378374/circle-launches-arc-mainnet-with-blackrock-dtcc-and-visa-as-validators", "published_at": "2026-09-16 14:56:02+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-09-16 15:16:12.918128+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-agents", "ai-infrastructure", "ai-policy"], "entities": ["Circle", "Arc", "Jeremy Allaire", "BlackRock", "DTCC", "Visa", "Mastercard", "USDC"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/circle-launches-arc-mainnet-with-blackrock-dtcc-and-visa-as-validators", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/circle-launches-arc-mainnet-with-blackrock-dtcc-and-visa-as-validators.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/circle-launches-arc-mainnet-with-blackrock-dtcc-and-visa-as-validators.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/circle-launches-arc-mainnet-with-blackrock-dtcc-and-visa-as-validators.jsonld"}}