USDC market value is up 80% from 2023 lows.
According to data from Blockworks Research, the supply of Circle's US dollar-backed stablecoin USD Coin (USDC) has increased by 80% since cyclical lows.
In the year As of January 2, USDC's circulating supply is approaching $44 billion, nearly double the low of $24 billion in 2023, according to CoinGecko.
Meanwhile, when users migrate beyond Ethereum, holdings are distributed equally between blockchain networks, Blockworks data analysis manager Dan Smith said in a Jan. 2 post on the X forum.
The transition will see an increase in onchain activity and the rise of alternative layer-1 networks such as Solana and Hyperliquid. Analysts expect the trend to continue as the market capitalization of the USDC could double this year.
Source: Dan Smith
Related: Grayscale Adds AI Launchpads, Solana DeFi Apps to Q1 2025 Top Tokens
Expanding networks
As of January 2, approximately 65% of USDC supplies are on Ethereum, 10% on Solana, and approximately 15% span Base and Arbitrum – both Ethereum Layer 2s – as well as Hyperliquid, a Layer 1 for low-latency trading.
In the year By 2023, the USDC remains heavily focused on Ethereum, which will account for 85% of the stablecoin's supply, Smith said.
This change is partly because “retailers are increasingly entering the crypto market through Solana [as] Speculation around Solana-based memecoins and AI agent tokens will intensify,” Grayscale said in a December research note.
In the year By 2024, the total value locked in at Solana has increased from $1.5 billion in January to nearly $8.5 billion in December, according to data from Defilama.
Source: CoinGecko
Boarding users
After Donald Trump won the presidential election in the United States, the stablecoin market capitalization increased significantly. The combined market capitalization of the three major stablecoins — Tethers USDT (USDT), USDC and Dai (DAI) — has grown to more than $25 billion, Citi said in a December research note.
Cryptocurrency researcher Steno Research expects USDC circulation to more than double by 2025 to around $100 billion.
“This development hinges on a critical assumption: Tether, the largest stablecoin, remains unregulated in the European Union,” Steno added.
If this happens, we expect European residents to adopt USDC as an alternative to Tether USDT.
Accelerating stablecoin adoption is especially critical for decentralized finance (DeFi), because “stablecoins are the way of decentralized finance,” Citi said.
In December, Grayscale added several DeFi applications to its list of top 20 tokens to watch in the first quarter of 2025, including two on Solana. They include Aetna, Jupiter and Gito.
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