The USDC Treasury has minted $250 million in new tokens, according to on-chain data highlighted by crypto commentator @whale_alert. The move is aimed at boosting market liquidity and reflects growing institutional engagement with stablecoins. The fresh mint comes amid a much larger issuance wave: on-chain tracker Lookonchain estimated that Circle minted approximately $5 billion worth of USDC over the past week.
Gross minting does not mean that $5 billion in new dollars instantly entered circulation. Circle uses pre-mint addresses on Solana, where USDC can be created and held before being released into circulation. Still, traders closely watch large USDC mints because they can signal that more liquidity is preparing to enter crypto markets.
The latest data underscores the scale of the move. USDC’s market cap is around $73.88 billion, up 2.67% over seven days, according to DefiLlama. The total stablecoin market cap stands at approximately $303.72 billion, an increase of roughly $2.83 billion within a week. Tether’s USDT remains the largest stablecoin with a market cap of about $183.17 billion, accounting for roughly 60% of the market. Lookonchain also noted that Circle and Tether together minted $3 billion in stablecoins within just 48 hours on August 21.
Transaction data from Visa Onchain Analytics via Allium shows that USDC adjusted transaction volume was $222.44 billion from August 19 through August 25, a slight decline of 0.4% from the prior week. However, transaction count jumped 31.5% from 14.27 million to 18.77 million, indicating that a similar dollar amount moved through a much larger number of transactions.
Demand for stablecoins is expanding beyond crypto exchange activity. Research published in March 2026 by Iñaki Aldasoro, Paula Beltran, and Federico Grinberg found that more than 70% of fiat-to-stablecoin transactions studied came from currencies other than the US dollar, creating a parallel crypto-foreign exchange market. The researchers concluded that stablecoins are “an emerging segment of global currency markets” with direct implications for financial stability.
Circle’s institutional expansion supports the rising issuance. In its Q2 earnings report released August 5, Circle reported total USDC circulation of $73.3 billion at quarter-end, up 19% year-on-year, and quarterly on-chain transaction volume of $14.8 trillion, a rise of 151%. Total revenue and net reserve income reached $701 million. Circle has also received OCC support to open Circle National Trust and a separate New York limited-purpose trust company, while its Arc blockchain is scheduled to go live on September 16.
