Tron Network’s Minting of USDC on Circle Comes to an Abrupt Halt

Circle, the company behind the USD Coin (USDC), has announced that it will no longer support the token on the Tron blockchain. This decision was made to ensure the trust, transparency, and safety of USDC. Circle stated in a blog post that it will immediately stop minting USDC on Tron and gradually phase out support for the blockchain network. However, the company will continue to facilitate transfers of USDC to other blockchains for its Circle Mint business customers until February 2025. Circle has advised its retail users and non-Circle customers to move their Tron-based USDC to an exchange that supports the token on a different blockchain. The reason for discontinuing support for Tron was not disclosed by Circle, but the company stated that it regularly assesses the suitability of all blockchains as part of its risk management process. Circle emphasized that this decision was made through a company-wide approach involving various departments. Tron, on the other hand, claimed that it did not receive any advance notice or further information from Circle regarding the withdrawal of support. Circle’s USDC stablecoin is the second-largest in terms of market capitalization, after Tether. In 2023, Circle denied providing services to Tron founder Justin Sun after being accused by an ethics group of being compromised by its integration with the Tron network. The Tron Foundation and Sun were sued by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in March 2023 for allegedly offering unregistered securities and engaging in manipulative trading.