Decoding the world of Web3 - one company at a time - Circle
If you've been keeping up with the news lately, you know that the business world is changing fast.
Web 3.0 is here, bringing a whole new set of opportunities to the table. The next few years will be so exciting that we can't imagine what they'll look like!
But to truly understand what's going on, we have decided to look into specific web3 companies evolving quickly in this brand-new space. This edition of the newsletter is the first one in this series; look out for more web3 company profiles in the future.
We're going to take a good look at these companies and see how they got started—what motivated them, what problems they were trying to solve, and how they plan on doing it differently than their competitors in this new era of tech innovation.
Today we will be focusing on a peer-to-peer digital payments company.
What is Circle? What do they do?
Circle is a global financial technology firm at the center of digital currency innovation and open financial infrastructure. They bridge the traditional financial system and the world’s leading public blockchains to unlock growth for businesses and investors worldwide. Its mission is to "raise global economic prosperity through the frictionless exchange of financial value."
It was founded by Jeremy Allaire and Sean Neville in October 2013. They are the creator of USD Coin (USDC) and made history by securing $440 million in private investment funds. The largest investment round recorded.
USD Coin (USDC) is a digital asset with a market capitalization of $52.56B. USD Coin is ranged as 4 in the global cryptocurrency rating with an average daily trading volume of $5.75B.
Circle's platform has supported over 100 million transactions worth tens of billions of dollars, with nearly 10 million retail customers, and over a thousand businesses, while storing and securing more than $5 billion in digital currency assets. Circle's USDC is the fastest growing full-reserve stablecoin globally, with 2.3 Billion in circulation.
How are they solving the market’s problems?
They enable easy access to money, a transparent way for businesses to transact, and a safe way for users to store their funds.
Their competitors include Stripe and PayPal, as well as other companies like BitPay, Coinbase, and Kraken.
Circle is unique in that they offer an open API that allows users to connect their business with its customers in an easy way. The Circle platform allows users to accept payments on their website or app without having to deal with many technical details.
Another feature of Circle is that it provides a deposit/withdrawal service so users can send money instantly into other accounts. Users don't have to wait days or weeks for funds to be deposited into their account, saving time and money for the user and their customers.Â
They’ve built an exchange platform that makes it easy for anyone to buy and sell digital currencies, as well as a suite of products that let businesses accept payments in different cryptocurrencies. And they’re not stopping there. They’re working on a new product to allow businesses to settle transactions in fiat currencies directly with their customers.
Web2 vs. Web3 Comparison
Circle is essentially a peer-to-peer lending platform, which means they don't deal with investors directly. Instead, they facilitate loans between individuals who want to make a loan and someone who wants to borrow money. They take a small fee on each transaction, but they also have an incentive structure where they get paid if you pay back your loan early or pay off your loan early.
In this way, Circle can be compared to Venmo: one person deposits money into their account, another person makes a withdrawal, and Venmo charges a fee for facilitating the transaction. But unlike Venmo, Circle doesn't hold onto your money—it just facilitates it between two people who want to borrow or lend money.
The Internet has been around for more than 30 years, and in that time, we've seen a lot of change. The web has evolved, along with our expectations of what it can do. New technology is making it possible to build something entirely new on top of the existing internet—and it will be awesome.
We're excited to see what comes next!
Keep an eye out for exciting developments in the web3 space by subscribing to our newsletterÂ
You can also attend our free web3 masterclass, led by NFT expert Atharva Sabnis. The masterclass will be hosted on 3rd September. Join in to get expertly curated resources and anecdotes of being a professional in web3.
If interested, register here - https://tally.so/r/mZjere