- Accelerates Mainstream Adoption by Enabling NFT Platforms to Accept Both 
Traditional and Crypto Payments

- Circle unveils plans to support BTC and ETH payments, as well as storage, 
custody and transfer of NFT assets

Circle, a global financial technology firm that provides payments and treasury 
infrastructure for internet businesses, today announced a comprehensive 
payments solution for non-fungible token (NFT) marketplaces and storefronts 
that enables them to accept credit card and crypto payments alike in order to 
attract more mainstream audience adoption. Circle today also unveiled 
forthcoming features that will be made available over the coming months, 
including support USDC, BTC and ETH payments, NFT custodial services, and 
yield-generating Circle accounts for NFT market operators. 

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1220689/Circle_Logo.jpg 

NFT marketplaces have surged in popularity over the past 12 months, but 
broad-based mainstream adoption is lagging due to the complexity of payment 
transactions, which usually require the use of cryptocurrencies. Circle's NFT 
solution simplifies buying and selling by enabling platforms to accept credit 
card payments alongside crypto, all with a seamless user experience. This makes 
NFT transactions easier by encouraging greater engagement, platform expansion 
and support for creators worldwide through the marriage of traditional payment 
rails and leading digital dollar stablecoin USD Coin (USDC).

NFTs have seen a meteoric rise in recent months – as platforms like NBA Top 
Shot [ 
https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3108894-1&h=361585148&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nbatopshot.com%2F&a=NBA+Top+Shot 
] skyrocket in popularity (Top Shot has seen a 400% increase in sales over the 
past 30 days) and digital art becomes mainstream (iconic auction house 
Christie's recently offered the first purely digital artwork with the auction 
of Beeple's Everydays [ 
https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3108894-1&h=3932891775&u=https%3A%2F%2Fonlineonly.christies.com%2Fs%2Fbeeple-first-5000-days%2Flots%2F2020&a=Everydays 
] for $69M). In February 2021 alone, sales volume across major NFT marketplaces 
grew nearly 800%, to more than $200M. 

"This is not only an important and valuable trend for marketplaces and 
creators, it represents incredible demand from customers – for collectibles, 
artwork, moments, and really anything that can be tokenized on the blockchain," 
said Jeremy Allaire, Circle Co-founder and CEO. "Circle looks forward to 
supporting the industry – creators, platforms, marketplaces, storefronts and 
customers – with our solution for enabling a user-friendly, mainstream payments 
experience with the power of crypto connectivity and USDC."

With Circle's payments and treasury infrastructure, NFT marketplaces and 
storefronts can create a seamless user experience for buyers and sellers alike:

    -- Build upon Circle's Payments, Payouts and Digital Dollar Accounts APIs
       to process transactions and use the Circle Account to maintain a
       scalable treasury infrastructure on the backend, making platform
       management easier than ever. 
    -- Choose to offer traditional and crypto payment options, or abstract
       crypto entirely from the user – all in service of greater convenience
       and efficiency alike. 

Over the coming months, Circle plans to release a range of features aimed at 
NFT marketplaces, storefronts and platforms:

    -- Support for BTC & ETH payments. NFT markets will be able to easily
       accept BTC and ETH as payment and payout methods, allowing both crypto
       HODLers and new mainstream users to pay with fiat and crypto. 
    -- Storage, Custody and Transfer of NFT assets. Circle's digital asset
       account infrastructure and APIs will enable NFT markets and properties
       to easily store NFT assets with best-in-class digital asset custody
       services, while also enabling their customers to transfer standard NFTs
       in and out of their markets and services. 
    -- Treasury and Yield Services. NFT markets are digital asset native
       businesses, and with funds and treasury accounts held with Circle, NFT
       developers can take advantage of Circle's new high-yield digital dollar
       accounts*, enabling idle working capital to earn between 4-8% APY on
       USDC.

These new areas of focus are just the beginning as Circle continues to build 
and partner with the leading projects, developers and brands that are 
innovating in the NFT commerce space.

This comes at a time of explosive growth for USDC, whose market cap is more 
than $10B and has more than doubled in 2021 alone. Dollar stablecoins like USDC 
have quickly become the preferred currency of NFT marketplaces and storefronts 
as they offer a convenient funding source for end users as well as the ability 
to streamline their operations and stay crypto-native as needed. In the future, 
Circle plans to expand its roadmap by accepting ETH payments as well as 
providing custody for NFTs.

For more information, contact our team [ 
https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3108894-1&h=2698659363&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.circle.com%2Fen%2Fcontact-sales&a=contact+our+team 
] , and read more about our NFT solution here [ 
https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3108894-1&h=1058754535&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.circle.com%2Fen%2Fa-simple-solution-for-non-fungible-token-nft-marketplaces&a=here 
] .

About Circle
Circle is a global financial technology firm that enables businesses of all 
sizes to harness the power of stablecoins and public blockchains for payments, 
commerce and financial applications worldwide. Circle's platform has supported 
over 100 million transactions worth tens of billions of dollars, with nearly 10 
million retail customers, over a thousand businesses, while storing and 
securing more than $5 billion in digital currency assets. Circle is also a 
principal developer of USD Coin (USDC), which together with Coinbase and the 
Centre Consortium oversees the standards and protocol for what has become the 
fastest growing, regulated, fully reserved stablecoin. USDC now stands at more 
than $10 billion market cap and is adding nearly $300 million net new digital 
dollars in circulation every week. Today, Circle's transactional services, 
business accounts, and platform APIs are giving rise to a new generation of 
financial services and commerce applications that hold the promise of raising 
global economic prosperity for all through programmable internet commerce. 
Learn more at https://circle.com

*Service offered through Circle International Bermuda Limited. Offering subject 
to business approval, geographical availability, and regulatory authorization, 
and there is no guarantee that the product will become available in a specific 
timeframe, or to a specific customer group or geography. Service offered 
through Circle International Bermuda Limited. It is anticipated that Circle 
International Bermuda Limited will enter into lending arrangements with one or 
more institutional borrowers, including Genesis Global Capital, LLC. You should 
carefully conduct your own investigations and analyses in connection with any 
participation in this product, including its objectives, risk factors, fees, 
and expenses and the information set forth in these materials. All prospective 
participants in the products described herein are advised to consult with their 
legal, accounting and tax advisers regarding any potential participation. Rates 
are purely indicative and are subject to change pending availability, approval 
and market conditions. Additional information is available upon request. 

SOURCE  Circle Internet Financial, Inc.

CONTACT:  Joshua Hawkins, josh@circle.com