Today stablecoin issuer Circle announced its official launch in Brazil, including a partnership with Latin America’s largest investment bank, BTG Pactual. It already has a relationship with Nubank, the neobank with around 100 million users.
BTG Pactual will become USDC’s direct distribution partner in Brazil, providing access to retail and institutional clients. This means that USDC has a local banking rail.
The investment bank already has its own US dollar stablecoin, BTGUSD, one of the first to be launched by a bank globally. However, the stablecoin issued on the Polygon blockchain is very tightly controlled, although it plans to expand access to the cryptocurrency exchange Crypto.com. The blockchain shows just two wallet addresses and only mints and burns, implying that all stablecoin transactions happen directly via the bank’s Mynt app. The current balance is $4.2 million.
“Our commitment to innovation led us to create Mynt, our own Crypto trading platform,” said André Portilho, Head of Digital Assets at BTG Pactual. “Our partnership with Circle is a testament to our belief that blockchain technology will form the new infrastructure of the financial industry.”
While the Circle announcement referred to the huge success of Brazil’s Pix mobile payment platform, it didn’t mention DREX, the pilot Brazilian wholesale CBDC solution that aims to support tokenization. Brazil’s central bank embraces innovation and it could be the country to lead the way in tokenization. Both Nubank and BTG Pactual are DREX participants, so it makes sense for Circle to want to have a presence.
“There are many powerful opportunities on the horizon when Brazil’s fintech-forward ecosystem converges with the world’s most accessible dollar platform,” said Jeremy Allaire, Co-Founder and CEO at Circle.
Circle expands its global reach
Meanwhile, Circle has been expanding its global footprint elsewhere. In Europe it recently landed its Digital Asset Service Provider (DASP) registration from France’s AMF, but it still needs final approval for stablecoins under Europe’s MiCA regulation from France’s ACPR. It also has a Singapore license and is collaborating with Japan’s SBI to circulate the stablecoin there.
