Coinbase Is Expanding USDC to the International Market  

The San Francisco-based cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase, is building on-ramps for access to USDC in countries other than the United States to further the cause of economic liberty worldwide. The goal of the exchange is to make the stablecoin available for broader adoption by more people by doing away with the fees usually associated with buying and selling USDC using currencies other than the US dollar.

According to Coinbase’s data, compared to other fiat currencies, one dollar can purchase three times as much USDC as other currencies. 

We're making it easier to buy USDC 🌎🌍🌏

Coinbase users around the world can now buy USDC with their local currency with no commission fees.https://t.co/w03mdH8Mvo

— Coinbase (@coinbase) October 20, 2022

The fact that there were costs associated with using it typically served as a barrier to increased utilization.

To keep up with competitors like Binance, Coinbase has been expanding its reach internationally. The crypto exchange obtained a Singaporean license to operate, joining many similar businesses in the region.

USDC has rapidly grown in popularity and is now a viable alternative to the USDT. The chief executive officer of its developer, Circle, has also stated that the stablecoin is doing better financially than ever.

Stablecoins Are Still In High Demand

Although demand for many other assets has fallen recently, stablecoins have maintained strong market demand. Statistics on stablecoin dominance compiled by Blockworks show that they are now at 16%, not far off from the all-time high of 18% reached in June 2022.

Tether’s CTO, Paolo Ardoino, affirmed that investors often utilize stablecoins to enter and exit positions more quickly and at a lower risk when the market is unstable. In his words;

“Stablecoins have been growing independently of market cycles simply because of their ability to improve financial inclusion. Stablecoins are also created based on market supply and demand, so when some crypto prices fall, traders may see this as a buying opportunity to use stablecoin to move in and out of positions.”

Tether’s USDT has the most significant market valuation of stable cryptocurrencies at $68.4 billion. Following closely behind with a market valuation of $43.9 billion is USDC. Tether is now available for transactions on many other blockchains, including Algorand, Avalanche, Ethereum, EOS, Polygon, Tezos, Tron, and Solana.

Five new networks, including two layer-2 ecosystems (Arbitrum and Optimism)., have been added to the USDC stablecoin’s underlying technology, representing a significant improvement. Organizations are also working to integrate USDC with Web3’s social networking features.

Coinbase Is Supporting Grayscale in Its SEC Case

Meanwhile, Coinbase has been engaging in several strategies to grow the company. The exchange has been active in some areas, including integrating a political crypto scorecard and releasing a node stack for Web3 developers.

Recent legal proceedings between Grayscale and the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) have benefited from its use. When the SEC denied Grayscale’s requests for bitcoin ETFs on the spot market, the company decided to take the matter to court.