At a glance
- Circle reported total revenue and reserve income of $865 million for the third quarter of 2026, up 17% from a year earlier, and net income from continuing operations of $226 million, up 5%, the company said on Wednesday.
- Footnotes to the results disclose a workforce reduction of about 5%, with $9.1 million in restructuring costs booked in the quarter, mostly severance and notice-period pay.
Circle Internet Group, the issuer of the USDC stablecoin, said its Q3 2026 results included $182 million in revenue from the presale of ARC, the token for its Arc blockchain.
Without that, the core business moved the other way. Reserve income, Circle’s return on the reserves behind USDC, fell 8% to $658 million, the company said. The return on those reserves dropped to 3.5%, down 0.61 percentage points from a year earlier.
Average USDC in circulation rose 8% to $73.3 billion, and $73.9 billion was outstanding at the end of September, according to the release. Circle put USDC’s share of the dollar stablecoin market at 27%, down 1.83 percentage points from a year earlier.
Distribution and transaction costs, mostly payments to partners that hold and promote USDC, fell to $409 million from $447 million. Adjusted EBITDA rose 85% to $317 million.
“In Q3, we saw continued proof that institutions are building and expanding on USDC,” chief executive Jeremy Allaire said in the release. “We also launched Arc on public mainnet with more than 100 institutional and ecosystem builders, giving them the infrastructure to build the next generation of financial applications.”
Job cuts and Tazapay
Circle said the cut of about 5% of its workforce was “designed to better align our organizational structure with our operating model and strategic priorities”. It did not say how many people were affected, Decrypt reported.
The company has signed a definitive agreement to buy Tazapay, a Singapore-based business-to-business payments platform with more than $25 billion in annualised payment volume, about 60% of which already involves stablecoins. The deal is expected to close in 2027, subject to regulatory approval. Circle’s own payments network, CPN, reached $41.3 billion in annualised volume, it said.
Context
Revenue was $701 million in the second quarter, according to the release’s quarterly table. Since then, Circle has launched its Circle Match rebate auctions for large minters, as CryptoWatchDesk reported on 23 Oct. Its largest rival, Tether, reported a $1.5 billion third-quarter profit in Tether’s third-quarter attestation on 30 Oct.
What it changes for users and merchants
The results do not change the terms of USDC for holders.
Circle, not holders, earns the interest on the reserves, which is why lower rates cut its reserve income. Merchants and payment firms in Asia and Latin America would gain Tazapay’s local payout rails if the deal closes. Samsung Wallet users in the US can already send USDC transfers in Samsung Wallet to bank accounts in more than 60 countries, according to the release.
Circle kept its full-year guidance, including adjusted operating expenses of $570 million to $585 million. US issuers move under the OCC’s final GENIUS Act rule, which takes effect on 18 Jan 2027. For the basics, see what a dollar stablecoin is.
Related: JPMorgan's 13F shows its Circle holding fell 96% in the third quarter, to 99,093 shares
This article is for information only and is not investment advice.