Circle Wants to Own Crypto’s Financial Stack, but Tether Still Owns the Dollar

The article argues that Circle is evolving beyond a simple USDC issuer into a broader crypto financial infrastructure company built around its Arc blockchain. Arc is described as a four-layer stack spanning base-chain assets, developer tools, Circle apps, and tokenized financial services, with over 100 firms reportedly on its testnet and 15 million transactions in the week ending July 15. Despite this expansion, Circle still derives most revenue from reserve interest, which accounted for 94% of Q1 revenue ($653 million of $694 million). Marketwise, the piece contrasts Circle’s growth narrative with Tether’s dominant position in the stablecoin market: USDT’s $184 billion market cap and far higher trading volume dwarf USDC’s $73 billion supply. It also notes Circle’s regulatory tailwind from final OCC approval, but highlights investor skepticism as Circle shares are down roughly 76% from their post-IPO peak. Overall, the article suggests a possible split stablecoin market, with regulated rails favoring USDC and offshore liquidity continuing to favor USDT.