Circle launches Arc public testnet, a new Layer 1 blockchain connecting global finance and technology with over 100 institutional partners — including BlackRock, Visa, AWS, and Anthropic — to power enterprise-grade payments, markets, and onchain applications.

Circle, the issuer of USDC, has launched the public testnet of Arc, a new open Layer 1 blockchain designed as an “Economic Operating System for the internet” with more than 100 institutional partners participating, including large financial, payments, cloud and AI firms such as BlackRock, Visa, AWS and Anthropic. Arc is built to be a stablecoin‑native network, using USDC as its gas token, and is aimed at enterprise‑grade use cases like payments, foreign exchange, capital markets and tokenized real‑world assets, with the testnet phase allowing institutions and developers to trial infrastructure, compliance, and integrations ahead of mainnet launch. According to Circle’s October 28, 2025 announcement, Arc’s public testnet opens with “over one hundred” launch and design partners spanning global banks, asset managers, payment networks, fintechs, infrastructure providers and cloud platforms, reflecting Circle’s strategy to position Arc as institutional‑grade blockchain rails for global finance. The network is EVM‑compatible, uses a high‑performance Malachite consensus engine for deterministic sub‑second finality, and integrates a built‑in StableFX engine to support multi‑currency stablecoin operations, all aimed at addressing pain points institutions face on existing public chains such as fee volatility, settlement uncertainty and limited privacy controls. Compliance and risk infrastructure firms like Elliptic are also participating on the testnet to provide blockchain analytics and policy controls, underscoring the focus on regulatory‑aligned, enterprise‑ready usage, while the public testnet phase is being used to validate security, performance, and partner integrations before a planned mainnet launch in 2026.

✨ AI-generated background, compiled from web sources — not editorial content.

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