Circle, a payments company and stablecoin operator, has introduced several new avenues toward financial inclusion, the Financial Times (FT) reported Wednesday (Nov. 17).
The initiative is called Circle Impact and has the goal of accelerating the use of Circle’s stablecoin, the USD Coin (USDC) for humanitarian causes, according to the report.
USDC operates from Circle in connection with crypto exchange Coinbase. Last year, the coin was used in Venezuela to help pay healthcare workers with money seized from the Maduro government, the report stated.
The move comes as global regulators are examining ways to supervise the $130 billion stablecoin industry, according to the report. Circle Impact’s creation shows the growing competition among companies look to promote their own digital currencies as the best ways to access fast and cheap payments.
“You don’t talk about sending ‘cross-border’ emails any longer, you just talk about sending emails,” said Circle Chief Strategy Officer and Head of Global Policy Dante Disparte, per the report. “We’re doing for money what email did for the transfer of information.”
The report stated that some of the other plans on the Circle Impact agenda include “allocating ‘billions’ of the cash and treasuries,” which the company said strengthen the $34 billion worth of the coin, to help minority-owned depository institutions and community banks. It will also help women and minority entrepreneurs through its crowdfunding platform SeedInvest.
Earlier this month, Circle Internet Financial launched Circle Ventures, a new project designed to invest in “compelling, early-stage blockchain projects and companies.”
Read more: USDC Coin Issuer Circle Launches Venture Fund
The projects and companies in question would be those that fulfill “Circle’s mission to raise global economic prosperity through the frictionless exchange of financial value.”
Companies in that portfolio have access to the SeedInvest network, which has over 500,000 investors and experience on internet capital formation.
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