Introduction
Circle, the stablecoin issuer, has announced the minting of USD Coin (USDC) natively on Ethereum’s Layer-2 scaling protocol, Polygon. This groundbreaking development eliminates the need for bridging the stablecoin from Ethereum to another blockchain, providing easy accessibility to both users and developers.
Seamless Integration with Polygon
Circle’s Mint and developer APIs have seamlessly integrated with Polygon-based USDC, leveraging Polygon’s impressive scaling capabilities. This integration opens up a plethora of opportunities for businesses and developers, enabling the construction of decentralized applications with USDC on Polygon. This offering ensures near-instant, low-fee transactions for various use cases, including payments, remittances, trading, borrowing, and lending.
Transition from Bridged USDC
Prior to Circle’s native Polygon USDC offering, users had to rely on bridged USDC (USDC.e) sourced from the Ethereum blockchain. This token, distinct from the new offering, is not issued by Circle and will be redeemable at a 1:1 ratio for United States dollars. Circle had facilitated deposits and withdrawals for USDC.e on Polygon through the Circle Mint and APIs, but this service was discontinued on November 10th.
Market Capitalization and Future Plans
The freshly minted Polygon USDC token currently boasts a market capitalization of approximately 4.3 million USDC within the scaling protocol, according to data from Polygonscan. Circle emphasizes that native Polygon USDC will support cost-effective global payments, remittances, trading, borrowing, and lending on decentralized finance platforms like Aave, Compound, Curve, Uniswap, and QuickSwap.
Interoperability and Cross-Chain Transfer
Circle plans to launch a cross-chain transfer protocol to Polygon, enabling interoperability with other blockchain networks. This move will allow the transfer of Polygon-based USDC to and from the Ethereum blockchain, enhancing the flexibility and accessibility of this digital asset.
