Circle, the issuer of the USDC stablecoin, raised $222 million in a presale of the native token for its in-house blockchain, Arc, which it is pitching to institutions, CNBC reported on May 11.

Andreessen Horowitz led the round with a $75 million investment. BlackRock, Apollo Fund, Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the parent of the New York Stock Exchange, SBI Group, Haun Ventures and crypto exchange Bullish also participated.

The presale valued the Arc network at $3 billion on a fully diluted basis, which includes all tokens that will be issued in the future.

Arc is a public blockchain for institutional finance. Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire (제레미 알레어) said blockchain infrastructure is becoming as important as mobile operating systems or cloud platforms. He said the company is entering the operating system business and is also moving into the app business.

Of Arc’s initial supply of 10 billion tokens, Circle will hold 25 percent, allowing it to earn validator infrastructure operations, fee revenue and staking income. Another 60 percent will be allocated to participants who build and use the Arc network, and the remaining 15 percent will be set aside as long-term reserves.

Circle also unveiled developer tools and services to support AI agents using USDC to manage transactions, access online services and make payments alongside the Arc launch. Allaire said the world is entering an era in which software machines drive economic systems.

Circle is the first listed company to conduct a token presale. CNBC reported that if Arc succeeds, Circle will be able to control the infrastructure that runs USDC on Ethereum and Solana in-house.

a16z Crypto, the crypto investment arm of Andreessen Horowitz, said USDC has become a trusted digital dollar but its current infrastructure was not built with institutions in mind. It said Arc solves that problem.