Auditing firm Grant Thornton confirm Circle’s USDC stablecoin is fully backed by fiat

Auditing firm Grant Thornton has confirmed that Circle’s USDC stablecoin was fully backed by fiat reserves at the close of 2018.

An attestation of funds was published on Wednesday, which stated that Circle had $251,211,209 held in custody accounts on December 31st. The amount of USDC tokens in circulation at the time was 251,211,148, meaning that they were fully backed.

Auditing of stablecoins has been a contentious issue in the cryptocurrency space over the past year. Bitfinex found themselves under scrutiny for failing to produce a reliable audit for their Tether reserves, eventually releasing an attestation from Deltec bank as opposed to an audit from a professional firm.

Grant Thornton’s attestation of USDC confirmed the process “was conducted in accordance with attestation standards established by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.”

Circle, who are backed by banking giant Goldman Sachs, currently have a total of 353 million tokens on the market. This means that since the turn of the year, they have added more than 100 million tokens.

Stablecoin usage has been appealing to cryptocurrency traders over the past 12 months as it can be used to hedge against the flailing price of digital assets. Holding an effective cash position with the ease of converting it directly back to cryptocurrency on an exchange allows traders to minimise the risks associated with the volatile digital asset class.

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