Here’s why the stablecoin faceoff is happening, who is vying for the final rose, and how it could impact the bottom line of the publicly traded stablecoin giant Circle.
More than 90% of those tokens are Circle’s USDC, the second-largest stablecoin by market capitalization, according to Artemis. But, on Friday, the Hyperliquid Foundation, one of the key entities behind the blockchain and exchange, said it would give the ticker USDH to any party who planned to create a stablecoin designed first and foremost for Hyperliquid.
The foundation is merely giving out the ticker and has said that the Hyperliquid blockchain will continue to support multiple stablecoins, according to a post on the ecosystem’s Discord channel. Still, crypto industry onlookers believe whoever owns USDH has a leg up on other stablecoins on Hyperliquid. “It’s going to be the stablecoin that the community actually wants, versus [USDC from] Circle, which is like the stablecoin that they’re stuck with,” said Bhau Kotecha, cofounder and head of Paxos Labs, one of the companies vying for the ticker.
Stablecoin issuers usually back their assets with dollar-like equivalents, such as U.S. Treasury bills. Issuers make money through collecting yield on the underlying holdings. In other words, billions in stablecoins on Hyperliquid translates to potentially hundreds of millions in revenue, given current interest rates. “Not every day does $5 billion come up for grabs,” said Andrew Van Aken, an Artemis data scientist, referring to the approximate total of stablecoins on Hyperliquid.
Still, to compete with Circle, which has historically not shared the yield it earns from its reserves with the companies that integrate its stablecoin, Hyperliquid suitors have promised to distribute money earned back into the blockchain’s ecosystem.
After the Hyperliquid foundation opened up calls for proposals to launch USDH, well-known crypto companies began to fight for the ticker. These include startups connected to the fintech giant Stripe, the stablecoin issuer Paxos, and a collection of DeFi projects. “We’re incredibly excited about Hyperliquid leading the way and taking control of its money,” Zach Abrams, the cofounder of Bridge, a stablecoin issuer recently acquired by Stripe, wrote on X.
But, regardless of who wins, a portion of Circle’s bottom line appears—at least temporarily—under threat. In the second quarter of this year, more than 96% of Circle’s revenue came from the interest it reaps from the reserves that back its stablecoin USDC. Given that almost a tenth of USDC’s total supply sits within the Hyperliquid exchange, according to data from Artemis Analytics, the winner of Hyperliquid’s stablecoin race directly impacts Circle’s bottom line. “It’s definitely a short-term headwind,” said Van Aken.
A spokesperson for Circle disputed that the result of the Hyperliquid stablecoin race would hurt the company: “We do not see the USDH ticker vote impacting USDC’s role as the primary stablecoin on Hyperliquid. Circle is continuing to deepen our commitment to the Hyperliquid ecosystem.”
