Circle is working to enter roughly 40 developing markets, CEO and chairman Jeremy Allaire told Reuters on Friday, speaking on the sidelines of the IMF and World Bank meetings in Bangkok. The plan covers Southeast Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East, where Allaire said businesses and individuals are pushing stablecoin demand higher as they seek access to the internet-based economic system.

Allaire framed the expansion as a turning point for the industry. "We're kind of going through an inflection point... a transition right now, and that transition is essentially moving from the early adopter phase of blockchain technology into the mainstream scaling phase," he said.

For Circle, the operator of the USDC stablecoin, the move is a distribution play. Emerging markets with weak banking rails and volatile local currencies have become the fastest-growing pool of stablecoin users, and entering them means striking partnerships, licensing arrangements and on-the-ground integrations across dozens of jurisdictions at once.

What does this change for USDC?

It sharpens the race with Tether. USDC remains the second-largest dollar-backed stablecoin by market capitalization, well behind Tether's USDt. But analysts at Bernstein, in a note reported by Cointelegraph on Aug. 24, said USDC has already overtaken its rival where it arguably counts more: transaction activity.

• USDC's share of adjusted stablecoin transaction volume rose from about 40% in 2025 to more than 60% so far in 2026, according to Bernstein.
• Bernstein expects a new growth cycle for USDC over the next 12 months.
• The bank cited renewed crypto market momentum, greater US regulatory clarity, tokenized capital markets and rising stablecoin use in payments as drivers.
• It also flagged early signs of stablecoin payments made by AI agents.

If volume leadership holds while Circle scales into 40 new markets, the gap between market cap and actual usage becomes the story. Tether still dwarfs USDC in float. Usage, though, is what payment partners, banks and regulators underwrite.

Building the payments stack

Circle has already been buying its way into cross-border payments. On Sept. 8, Cointelegraph reported that Circle agreed to acquire Singapore-based payments platform Tazapay in a $400 million all-stock deal expected to close in 2027.

The acquisition and the 40-market push point in the same direction. Circle wants to be settlement infrastructure for money movement, not just a token issuer. Tazapay gives it cross-border payment rails in Asia. The emerging-market expansion gives those rails demand.

The Bangkok timing matters too. Allaire made the comments at the IMF and World Bank meetings, in front of the very policymakers who will decide how stablecoin issuers are licensed, reserved and supervised in developing economies. Circle's growth case in these markets depends on those regulatory doors opening rather than closing.

The next 12 months, per Bernstein's window, will show whether mainstream scaling is a real phase change or another adoption promise.