Money moves like information, not like a wire transfer.

Arc is an open Layer-1 blockchain built by Circle, the company behind USDC. Most chains make you buy a separate volatile token just to pay for gas. Arc removes that entirely — gas is paid directly in USDC, so the dollars you already hold are the only thing you need to transact.

Under the hood, Arc runs on the Malachite consensus engine, delivering sub-second deterministic finality. There's no waiting around guessing whether a transaction landed — it settles almost instantly, the way a modern payment rail should.

It's fully EVM-compatible and wired natively into Circle's stack — USDC, CCTP, and Gateway — which is why over 100 institutions including BlackRock, Visa, and HSBC are already building on the public testnet. Mainnet is targeted for summer 2026.