Circle launches euro-backed stablecoin EUROC

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USD Coin (USDC) issuer Cir­cle Inter­net Finan­cial is launch­ing a ful­ly-reserved sta­ble­coin pegged to the euro, sig­nal­ing to the mar­ket that demand for cryp­to for­eign exchange ser­vices remains high despite recent indus­try turmoil. 

Euro Coin, or EUROC, will be avail­able for trad­ing on June 30, Cir­cle said Thurs­day in a state­ment that was shared with Coin­tele­graph. Like USDC, Euro Coin is a reg­u­lat­ed sta­ble­coin that is ful­ly backed by reserves — in this case, the euro. That means every EUROC token in cir­cu­la­tion will have an equiv­a­lent euro-denom­i­nat­ed reserve held in cus­tody at finan­cial insti­tu­tions reg­u­lat­ed by the Unit­ed States. 

Sil­ver­gate Bank, a cryp­to-friend­ly finan­cial insti­tu­tion, was list­ed as the ini­tial cus­to­di­an for the euro-pegged stablecoin.

EUROC sta­ble­coin gives busi­ness­es wider access to euro liq­uid­i­ty, which can be used for pay­ments, trad­ing, lend­ing and bor­row­ing. The sta­ble­coin will ini­tial­ly launch on the Ethereum blockchain as an ERC-20 stan­dard token.

In terms of for­eign exchange turnover, the euro is the sec­ond largest fiat cur­ren­cy in the world, accord­ing to the Bank for Inter­na­tion­al Set­tle­ment (BIS). The BIS’ 2019 Tri­en­ni­al Cen­tral Bank Sur­vey found that the euro was on one side of 32% of all cur­ren­cy trades. 

Relat­ed: Cryp­to Biz: Sta­ble­coins are paving the way for mass adop­tion of cryp­to, June 2–8

Launched in 1999, the euro is the com­mon cur­ren­cy of the 19-mem­ber Euro­zone. Its dom­i­nance as a trad­ing pair is fur­ther reflect­ed in the Unit­ed States Dol­lar Index, or DXY, where it holds a 57.6% weighting.

Sta­ble­coins were ini­tial­ly con­ceived as a way to give cryp­to traders access to liq­uid­i­ty due to bank­ing restric­tions on dig­i­tal assets. How­ev­er, their util­i­ty has expand­ed sig­nif­i­cant­ly over the years. Sta­ble­coins now serve the unbanked and under­banked pop­u­la­tions, as well as users in coun­tries where access to dol­lars is restrict­ed due to cap­i­tal con­trols or sanc­tions. As Coin­tele­graph report­ed, Cir­cle recent­ly launched ded­i­cat­ed busi­ness accounts for USDC trans­ac­tions, under­scor­ing the grow­ing demand for sta­ble­coin pay­ments among enterprises. 

The glob­al sta­ble­coin mar­ket is present­ly worth more than $157.5 bil­lion, accord­ing to Coin­Mar­ket­Cap. The mar­ket cap of USDC stands at $54.2 billion.



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