What is USD Coin (USDC)?

USD Coin (USDC) is a digital stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar. It operates on the Ethereum, Stellar, Algorand, and Solana blockchains. As of October 2021, USDC is the second-largest dollar stablecoin asset in the world by market capitalization, with a total valuation of USD 32 billion. USDC was initially created by the Centre consortium, which includes its two main founding members Circle and Coinbase. Each USDC token is backed by $1 held in reserve and regularly audited by Grant Thornton, a major accounting corporation. USDC was launched in September of 2018, and during March 2021 it was announced that Visa would facilitate the use of USDC for settlement on its payment network.