Circle Launches cirBTC

Circle, the company best known as the issuer of the USDC stablecoin, has officially announced plans to launch cirBTC - its proprietary version of wrapped Bitcoin. The new token will directly compete with BitGo’s WBTC and Coinbase’s cbBTC and is specifically designed for institutional users, including OTC desks, market makers, and lending protocols.

According to the announcement, cirBTC will be fully backed by Bitcoin at a 1:1 ratio, with real-time on-chain reserve verification. The token will launch first on Ethereum and later expand to Circle’s own Layer-1 blockchain (Circle Arc) and the Circle Mint platform. This will enable institutions to use BTC safely and neutrally within DeFi while seamlessly integrating it with the USDC ecosystem.

“cirBTC was built to deliver institutions a highly secure and neutral version of wrapped BTC,” Circle states on its official product page.

The wrapped Bitcoin market is currently dominated by two major players:

• WBTC (BitGo), market cap approximately $8 billion
• cbBTC (Coinbase), market cap approximately $5.9 billion

Together they account for over 208,000 BTC. Circle is entering this space at a moment when financial institutions are aggressively accumulating Bitcoin and actively seeking reliable ways to deploy it in decentralized protocols.

The announcement was made on April 3, 2026, via a post on X (according to Cointelegraph). The launch is still subject to regulatory approvals, and no exact date has been confirmed yet. Industry experts believe cirBTC could significantly strengthen Circle’s position not only in the stablecoin sector but also in the broader tokenized Bitcoin infrastructure market.

For institutional players, this is a major development: enhanced reserve transparency, deep integration with Circle’s trusted products, and a strong compliance focus make cirBTC an attractive alternative for large institutions that have previously avoided wrapped assets due to custody and counterparty trust concerns.