Circle Reports $865 Million Q3 Revenue With USDC Transaction Volume Up 49%

Reserve Income Falls as Presale Fills the Gap

Circle Internet Group (CRCL) reported $865 million in third-quarter revenue and reserve income on Wednesday, a 17% year-over-year increase that beat the $778 million analyst estimate by more than 11%. The release settles where that growth came from. What it leaves open is how much of it repeats, because the fastest-growing line on the income statement is not one the company refills every quarter. The earnings release filed with the SEC shows net income from continuing operations up 5% to $226 million, adjusted EBITDA up 85% to $317 million and diluted earnings of $0.84 per share against $0.64 a year ago, with adjusted EPS of $0.84 running far ahead of the 37-cent consensus. The core business softened underneath. Reserve income, the interest earned on assets backing the stablecoin, fell 8% to $658 million as the average return on those assets dropped 61 basis points to 3.5%. Average USDC circulation rose 8% to $73.3 billion, cushioning rather than offsetting the yield decline. Other revenue jumped to $207 million from $28.5 million a year earlier, driven mostly by $182 million recognized from the ARC token presale, about 21% of quarterly revenue. Strip the presale out and revenue lands near $683 million, below the $740 million posted a year ago. USDC onchain trading volume climbed 49% to $13.9 trillion and the USDC price held its $1 peg throughout, yet the token's market share of 27% at the end of September was down 1.83 percentage points year over year. Distribution and transaction costs fell 8% to $412 million, leaving $453 million after those costs against $292 million a year earlier, while operating expenses rose 16% to $245 million and full-year adjusted operating expense guidance held at $570 million to $585 million.

Arc Mainnet and a $41.3 Billion Run Rate

The quarter was Arc's first with the chain live on public mainnet. Circle launched the Arc blockchain on September 16 with 11 founding validators and more than 100 institutional and ecosystem builders, after developers built over 1,200 projects during the private phase. The network charges fees in USDC and supports tokenized financial assets; 10 billion ARC tokens have been created, though creation does not mean circulation, and a shift to proof-of-stake is planned for 2027. The Circle Payments Network, which links banks and payment firms for cross-border settlement over stablecoins and local banking rails, posted $41.3 billion in annualized payment volume, a run rate the company separates from revenue and roughly 2.8 times the $14.7 billion annualized pace disclosed at the end of June, with 205 financial institutions enrolled per Circle's official update. That print lands in a quarter when PayFi settlement has been a recurring theme across the USDC ecosystem. Acquisition widens the same lane: Circle reaffirmed its agreement to buy Tazapay, a Singapore-based cross-border provider, for roughly $400 million in shares, a business handling more than $25 billion in annualized payments through over 60 banking and fintech partners across more than 100 markets, about 60% of it already involving stablecoins, with closing expected in 2027 pending regulatory approval. Binance committed $100 million in September for roughly 1.24 million Circle shares under an expanded five-year partnership promoting USDC on the exchange. Beneath those headlines, USDC issuance and redemptions each ran to $104 billion in the quarter, wallets holding more than $10 of the token reached 7.3 million, and the company trimmed about 5% of its staff, a reduction it tied to aligning the organization with its operating model, booking a $9.15 million restructuring charge that mostly covered severance and benefits.

CRCL at $74.01 After the Print

Premarket trading treated the results cautiously, with CRCL down about 1.2% before the open, but COINOTAG data shows the stock at $74.01, up 1.38% over 24 hours inside a $71.86 to $78.18 range. COINOTAG's composite scoring puts the strongest resistance at $76.17, rated 94 out of 100, and the deepest support at $69.84, rated 97; the daily trend is still a downtrend, with a 38.2 RSI and a bearish MACD signal. The larger shift is in the revenue mix, as growth now runs through fees, token sales and payment infrastructure rather than yield on reserves, the pattern we mapped in Blockchain Revenue and Profit. What the release does not answer is how much of the $182 million presale recognition recurs in coming quarters, and the filing offers no guidance on that point.