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Renowned investor and chairman of Shenzhen Oriental Harbor Investment Management Co., Ltd., Dan Bin, stated on social media, "Due to a strong recommendation from researchers, I have made a small investment in Circle Internet Group (CRCL.US). CRCL surged significantly on Monday, becoming one of the standout performers in the U.S. stock market that day. The core catalyst for this surge is the key progress of the U.S. CLARITY Act, which has reached a compromise on stablecoin regulatory provisions in the Senate, clearing the main differences for the advancement of the bill and completely resolving the long-term regulatory uncertainties in the industry, opening up long-term growth space for compliant stablecoin leaders like Circle.The market generally expects that as the regulatory framework is implemented, the compliance advantages of USDC will be further strengthened, with market share likely to continue to increase in emerging scenarios such as cross-border payments and AI intelligent transactions. On the fundamental side, Circle's core business is entering an explosive growth phase. The circulation of USDC it issues has surpassed $79 billion, setting a historical high, and the interest income from reserve assets has significantly increased. The company's profit expectations for the first quarter of 2026 are clear, and the fundamental performance continues to solidify.At the same time, a new industry narrative of AI + stablecoins is emerging, with USDC as the base currency for on-chain transactions, and its value positioning is being comprehensively upgraded. The market is continuously advancing the valuation reshaping process from "crypto cyclical stocks" to "Web3 + AI infrastructure targets." In addition, the overall sentiment in the crypto market is warming up, adding further momentum to stock price increases. Bitcoin once broke through the $80,000 mark, driving a collective strengthening of crypto concept stocks, with market liquidity and risk appetite significantly increasing, and funds accelerating their entry into the market. CRCL, as a core target in this sector, is favored by capital.Moving forward, two key points need to be closely monitored: first, the release of the first-quarter financial report data on May 11, which will verify the performance realization; second, the final implementation rhythm of the stablecoin bill. If the regulatory and fundamental logic continues to be realized, CRCL is expected to welcome a new round of valuation increases."

According to Gate market data, U.S. stocks closed lower on Monday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average initially down 1.1%, the S&P 500 down 0.4%, and the Nasdaq Composite down 0.19%. Apple Inc. (AAPL.O) fell 1%, Intel Corporation (INTC.O) dropped nearly 4%, Circle (CRCL.N) surged 20%, and Micron Technology (MU.O) rose 6%. The Nasdaq China Golden Dragon Index closed down 0.09%, while NIO Inc. (NIO.N) rose nearly 3%.

The core institution for custody and settlement in the U.S. market, the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), announced that it will begin facilitating preliminary, limited real asset production transactions in July 2026, with a full launch of its tokenization services in October. This service was approved at the end of last year through a No-Action Letter from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), allowing DTCC to provide participants with the ability to tokenize specific high liquidity assets on a pre-approved blockchain during a three-year authorization period. These assets include components of the Russell 1000 Index, ETFs tracking major U.S. stock indices, as well as U.S. Treasury securities, notes, and bonds.DTCC President and CEO Frank La Salla stated, "We believe that tokenization will significantly change the way markets operate, bringing new levels of liquidity, transparency, and efficiency to investors." More than 50 companies are set to participate in DTCC's industry working group, including Morgan Stanley, Nasdaq, Kraken's parent company Payward, and Robinhood Markets, while companies like BlackRock and Circle have provided feedback. As financial firms explore bringing traditional assets onto the blockchain, interest in tokenization has surged, and this shift is expected to enable 24/7 trading and faster settlement speeds.

The largest regulated electronic currency token issuer in the EU, Circle, announced that it has obtained approval from the French Financial Markets Authority (AMF) on April 20, 2026, to provide crypto asset services under the framework of the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA).This approval allows Circle France to provide custody and transfer services for its issued stablecoins USDC and EURC in accordance with Article 60(4) of MiCA. This move enables Circle France to offer these services to customers in the European Economic Area (EEA).Dante Disparte, Circle's Chief Strategy Officer and Global Head of Policy and Operations, stated, "This milestone reflects our ongoing commitment to operate within the European regulatory framework and support the establishment of a trusted digital financial infrastructure in France and across the EU." This move marks another significant step in Circle's ongoing commitment to regulatory compliance and building a trusted digital financial infrastructure in Europe.

According to the latest 13F filing disclosed by Dan Bin's fund "Oriental Harbor," the fund increased its holdings of 31,700 shares of CRCL during the latest reporting period, valued at 3.02 million dollars.According to market news, the cryptocurrency company Coinbase was newly included in the Oriental Harbor portfolio in the second quarter of 2025, with a holding value of approximately 54.7 million dollars.

Circle stated on the X platform that Circle Ventures is purchasing AAVE tokens because strong DeFi infrastructure does not build itself.Aave is helping to shape the future of on-chain finance, and Circle is supporting this ecosystem and the entire community built around it.

According to official news, Banking Circle has officially launched a stablecoin settlement service today.Previously, the bank had obtained a crypto asset service provider (CASP) license issued by the Luxembourg financial regulator CSSF. The new service supports instant two-way exchanges between fiat currencies and mainstream stablecoins such as USDC, USDG, and EURI, and relies on the bank's core platform to achieve round-the-clock settlement and regulatory traceability. Currently, the global market value of stablecoins is approximately 250 billion euros, with an annual payment transaction volume of about 330 billion euros and a monthly on-chain transaction volume exceeding 80 trillion euros.Banking Circle CEO Laust Bertelsen stated that stablecoins have become the core infrastructure for cross-border settlement and fund management. This launch aims to combine the efficiency of blockchain payments with banking compliance standards to serve its global client base of over 750 payment institutions.

According to official data, in the 7 days ending April 23, Circle issued approximately 5.1 billion USDC, redeemed about 5.8 billion USDC, and the circulation decreased by approximately 700 million. The total circulation of USDC is 78 billion, with reserves of about 78.2 billion USD, including overnight reverse repos of about 47.2 billion USD; Treasury bills with maturities of less than 3 months of about 19.4 billion USD; deposits from systemically important institutions of about 11 billion USD; and other bank deposits of about 600 million USD.

Circle Chief Economist Gordon Liao submitted a governance discussion proposal for Aave, suggesting adjustments to the USDC interest rate parameters of the Aave v3 Ethereum core market to address the high utilization and liquidity strain that persisted for several days following the KelpDAO rsETH event.The proposal suggests raising the "Slope 2" to 40% initially, with a target of 50%, while lowering the optimal utilization rate to attract more USDC deposits. Some members of the Aave community believe that higher borrowing costs may exacerbate the liquidation risk for borrowers. Data shows that Aave's current total locked value is approximately $15.3 billion.

Circle Chief Economist Gordon Liao initiated a proposal on the Aave governance forum, suggesting an emergency adjustment to the USDC interest rate parameters in the Aave V3 Ethereum main pool to address the situation where the pool's utilization rate has remained at a very high level of 99.87% for four consecutive days following the KelpDAO attack incident.Liao stated that Aave's current interest rate mechanism has failed to effectively "clear" the market. The current supply of the pool is $1.89 billion, with the borrowing amount also at $1.89 billion, and available liquidity is less than $3 million. The borrowing interest rate remains at the upper limit after the inflection point (around 14%), and over the past 24 hours, the pool size has shrunk by about $60 million—this is due to repayment funds being used one by one to meet the withdrawal demands in the queue.Therefore, the Slope 2 parameter in the USDC deposit interest rate curve should be immediately increased from about 10% to 40% through the Risk Steward mechanism, and further confirmation to raise the target to 50% should be achieved through governance voting within 5 to 7 days. Meanwhile, the optimal utilization will be adjusted down from 92% to 87% during the transition phase, and after final confirmation, it will be reduced to 85%. According to Liao's proposal, under the new parameter settings, when the utilization rate reaches 100%, the maximum USDC deposit interest rate will increase from about 12.6% to 48.2%.

Gate held the Institutional Circle event in Hong Kong, focusing on the theme "AI Reshaping Crypto Liquidity & Market Access," gathering several institutional representatives from the Asia-Pacific region to discuss the evolution of the crypto market structure and the path to liquidity reshaping. Gate's founder and CEO Dr. Han attended the event and interacted with institutional guests on-site.At the event, Gate's Global Institutional Head Addis Hu delivered the opening speech and shared insights on the platform's service capabilities and market changes in the context of deepening institutional participation. AWS Senior Regional Business Development Manager Ethan Hui shared industry insights from the perspectives of technical infrastructure and asset services.During the discussion session, attendees engaged in in-depth discussions on the evolution of liquidity, changes in market structure, and trends in multi-asset allocation against the backdrop of continuous institutional capital inflow. Overall, this event provided institutions with a reference for understanding current market structure changes and future allocation logic, further reflecting that the industry is moving towards a more mature and structured development stage.

Gate will hold the "Institutional Circle: Al Reshaping Crypto Liquidity & Market Access" institutional exchange event in Hong Kong, aimed at institutional participants, focusing on discussions related to "AI Reshaping Crypto Liquidity and Market Structure." The event will invite institutional founders and business leaders from the Asia-Pacific region to explore the direction of industry evolution from a practical perspective.On the day of the event, Addis Hu, Global Head of Institutions at Gate, will deliver the opening speech and a keynote address; Ethan Hui, Senior Regional Business Development Manager at AWS, and Chen Zhao, Executive Director of Digital Assets and CEO of FinChain, will also attend as special guests and give speeches.In addition, the event will include registration and gift distribution, free networking, and a dinner segment, providing attendees with opportunities for in-depth communication and resource connection, further promoting institutional collaboration and industry cooperation.

Pablo Hernandez de Cos, General Manager of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), stated that global coordination on stablecoin regulation is crucial to prevent severe market fragmentation; otherwise, regulatory differences across jurisdictions could lead to regulatory arbitrage.He pointed out that stablecoins are typically pegged to the US dollar at a 1:1 ratio, which could undermine monetary and fiscal policy, trigger pressures in financial markets, and hinder efforts to combat illegal financing. Currently, the two major stablecoins issued by Tether and Circle account for about 85% of the global circulation of stablecoins, which is approximately $315 billion. He also mentioned that these two types of stablecoins are closer to securities rather than currencies in terms of redemption friction and operate more like ETFs.

According to Ark Invest Tracker data, Cathie Wood's ARK Invest reduced its holdings by 11,465 shares of Circle stock (approximately $1.215 million) and 31,417 shares of Bullish stock (approximately $1.367 million).