Circle, the stablecoin financial platform, debuts on Wall Street with gains of up to 230%.

The financial platform Circle Internet made an impressive debut on the New York Stock Exchange today. According to Bloomberg, the company's shares rose 123% after raising nearly $1.1 billion in its initial public offering (IPO). In fact, the offering was extended twice during the session due to very strong demand.

Shares opened at $69 each, more than double the initial offering price. Circle and several of its shareholders—including co-founder and CEO Jeremy Allaire —sold a total of 34 million shares, after increasing the offering from an initial 32 million.

This initial public offering gives Circle a market value of $15.4 billion based on outstanding shares. Accounting for employee shares, restricted stock, and warrants, the company would have a fully diluted valuation of approximately $18.3 billion.

Circle is known for issuing USDC , a stablecoin backed by dollar reserves and designed to always maintain a value of $1. This type of digital asset is gaining attention because it could soon be officially regulated in the US , which would facilitate institutional adoption . In fact, some major Wall Street banks are currently considering creating their own stablecoins .

At the end of March, USDC held 29% of the stablecoin market , according to CoinMarketCap data compiled by Bloomberg. As of May 29, there were about $61 billion in USDC tokens in circulation , according to Circle's website.

Offer structure

Circle has sold 14.8 million new shares, while existing shareholders have liquidated 19.2 million. Demand has been so high that the number of orders has exceeded the number of shares available by more than 25 times . The company initially planned to offer 24 million shares at a price between $24 and $26, but strong market interest has led to an expansion of the offering and a wider price range.

Among the interested investors is ARK Investment Management , the technology firm founded by Cathie Wood , which was considering investing up to $150 million. Meanwhile, BlackRock , the world's largest asset manager, plans to acquire around 10% of the shares offered. The latter also manages a money market fund for Circle, which holds 90% of the reserves backing USDC. The fund had $53.3 billion in assets as of May 29.

The shares are now listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol CRCL.

The platform was already valued at $7.7 billion in 2022 during a private investment round, as shown by PitchBook data. Circle previously attempted to go public through a merger with a SPAC (Special Purpose Acquisition Company), a very common model in 2021 and 2022, but ultimately abandoned that option. Had the merger gone through, the merger would have valued the company at $9 billion.

Prior to this IPO, Jeremy Allaire held 23.1% of the company's voting power. Other major shareholders included General Catalyst (8.9%) and IDG Capital (8.8%).

The offering has been led by JPMorgan , Citigroup and Goldman Sachs , and the shares are already trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol CRCL .