Compilation: Vernacular Blockchain

Circle's IPO on June 5, ( attracted widespread attention, marking an important moment for stablecoins and the broader cryptocurrency ecosystem. With the total market value of stablecoins recently surpassing $250 billion and continuing to grow rapidly, the financial community is increasingly aware of the profound changes taking place.

However, although most reports focus on valuation speculation, listing mechanisms, or comparisons with Coinbase, the significance of Circle's listing goes far beyond this. It is not just an isolated liquidity event or a fintech story; Circle's entry into the public market is more like a turning point in how digital financial infrastructure is perceived, valued, and integrated into the broader economy.

Circle and the Upcoming IPO Wave

On May 20, Circle secretly submitted its listing application, marking its second attempt after terminating the SPAC deal in 2022. Timing is crucial. This is not 2021, when cryptocurrency IPOs were more about retail investors' FOMO) fearing missing out( and the bull market frenzy. The situation in 2025 is entirely different: a spot Bitcoin ETF has been approved in the U.S., trading volumes are recovering, stablecoin legislation is actively advancing in Congress, and institutional capital is returning with a greater focus on practical use cases and long-term holding.

The IPO itself performed exceptionally. Circle priced its shares at $31 each on June 5, and on the first day, the stock price soared by 168% to close at $83.23. The next day, on June 6, it rose another 30% to $107.70, with a cumulative increase of nearly 250% over two days. According to Jay Ritter, this is the highest debut performance since 1980. This explosive start propelled its market value from an initial $6.8 billion to over $21.6 billion, although due to Wall Street's common underpricing strategy, about $3 billion in market value was "left on the table" to excite investor enthusiasm.

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Source: Bloomberg

Circle's market performance may set a precedent for other digital asset infrastructure companies considering going public. Companies like Paxos, BitGo, and those backed by Thiel with exposure to stablecoins have quietly prepared to enter the public market. Circle's IPO not only provides them with a blueprint and valuation benchmark, but more importantly, it signifies a broader legitimization of "stablecoins as infrastructure," the implications of which far exceed current market pricing.

Stablecoin: Orbit, Fuel, Distribution Layer

To understand why this IPO is important, one must look beyond the USDC Token itself and focus on its underlying business model. Circle earns returns by holding reserve assets that are pegged to USDC at a 1:1 ratio, typically short-term U.S. Treasury securities ). This business is fundamentally based on capital efficiency and regulatory compliance, rather than speculative token economics, and it is becoming the foundation for a broader platform.

Circle's strategy is increasingly focused on positioning USDC as the settlement layer of the internet, covering merchant payments, fund management, cross-border capital flows, and the future integration of real-world asset ( RWA ) tokenization. Interestingly, current stablecoin activity still primarily revolves around trading and investment, rather than payments, remittances, or RWA.

Source: Chainalysis, Fireblocks

As shown in the figure above, approximately 67% of stablecoin trading volume is still driven by capital market activities: providing funding for crypto trading, transferring funds between trading platforms, and arbitraging between ecosystems. This clearly indicates that we are still in the early monetization stage of the "pick and shovel" layer. As our lives, infrastructure, and financial ecosystems become increasingly digitized, the future utility of stablecoins in terms of liquidity, portability, and programmability will continue to rise.

The "GENIUS Act": The Intersection of Clear Policy and Open Markets

The timing of Circle's IPO also coincides with significant progress in the policy area. The "GENIUS Act," the first federal framework for stablecoins in the United States, was passed in the Senate on June 17 with rare bipartisan support of 68 to 30, granting the Treasury broad regulatory powers and opening the door for banks, fintech companies, and retailers to issue dollar-pegged Tokens.

While most headlines focus on regulatory clarity and the strength of the dollar, a deeper significance is quietly emerging. The bill accelerates the global output of the dollar through private stablecoins, potentially making tokenized government bonds held by companies like Circle more trusted than some local central banks.

This could also inject new momentum into "bridge assets" like XRP, as they will benefit from a fragmented stablecoin ecosystem that requires cross-network settlement. Ethereum, as the core infrastructure for stablecoins and decentralized finance ( DeFi ), may also benefit indirectly and become a pillar of digital finance operations.

The bill still needs to be coordinated with the House's "STABLE Act", but it currently marks a historic shift in the synchronization of regulatory acceptance and market adoption.

Lessons from early adopters like Tron

To understand the future development direction of stablecoins, it is worth looking at the areas where they have already flourished. Tron has climbed to eighth place in the global cryptocurrency rankings, with a market value exceeding $26 billion, providing a blueprint for this transformation. As the largest stablecoin settlement layer, Tron processes 2,000 transactions per second, with fees nearly zero ( usually less than 1 cent, while Ethereum exceeds $10 ) and handles 8.5 million transactions daily, with block reliability reaching 99.7%. The network processes $694.5 billion in USDT transactions each month, with Tether ( holding a dominant 90% share in stablecoin payments, highlighting its practicality.

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Source: TradingView, McKayResearch

The above chart covers the period from 2022 to 2025, showing that the growth of Tron is in sync with the total market value of stablecoins, entering the top ten in the fourth quarter of 2024. Tron has 6 million daily active addresses, comparable in scale to Solana, and its success stems from early stablecoin adoption. Investors are starting to take notice of this, but few connect it with the infrastructural potential hinted at by Circle's IPO.

A key data point: The top ten wallet clusters on Tron show a cyclical pattern, indicating that stablecoins are more often used for short-term operating capital rather than passive storage. This supports the view that stablecoins function more like trading fuel rather than savings accounts, meaning they are infrastructure rather than end assets. Ultimately, the chains that win the flow of stablecoins tend to attract users, developers, and ultimately achieve enterprise adoption.

Conclusion: Flagship IPO, a New Trajectory in Digital Finance

In many ways, Circle's IPO is less about the current uses of stablecoins and more about the fields they are about to empower: tokenized government bonds, RWA markets on public blockchains, cross-border payments, or settlement infrastructure for private banking networks.

At the same time, this IPO is not only about capital acquisition but also about accepting regulatory scrutiny, compliance, and alignment with institutions. This itself could be considered an asset, especially when investors start to differentiate between digital asset projects that operate like protocols and those that operate like financial service providers.

The market often underestimates infrastructure because it seems "boring." But when infrastructure becomes the cornerstone of the next generation financial stack, it will become immensely important.

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