Stablecoin issuer Circle said it plans to launch its own version of a wrapped Bitcoin, which would put it against incumbents Coinbase and BitGo as it targets institutional users.
The asset, called cirBTC and announced on Thursday, is set to launch on Ethereum, backed 1:1 by bitcoin (BTC) and aimed at over-the-counter desks, market makers and lending protocols.
Circle said the asset is designed to provide institutions with a “highly secure and neutral version of wrapped BTC.”
Financial institutions, which have become significant buyers of Bitcoin, have been actively exploring decentralized finance. Wrapped versions of Bitcoin would allow the asset to be used on other chains, such as Ethereum, giving them access to DeFi.
In addition to Ethereum, the new asset will also launch on Circle’s layer-1 blockchain Arc and its Circle Mint platform, said Circle.
Cointelegraph contacted Circle for further details, but did not receive an immediate response.
Circle’s new wrapped Bitcoin joins a market currently led by BitGo’s Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) and Coinbase Wrapped Bitcoin (cbBTC).
Coinbase’s cbBTC was launched in September 2024 and has a current market capitalization of $5.9 billion and a current supply of 88,800 tokens.
BitGo’s wBTC is the dominant wrapped Bitcoin token, with a market capitalization of about $8 billion and 119,157 tokens in circulation. However, that figure is roughly half its November 2021 peak, when Bitcoin hit its cycle all-time high.
Related: WBTC expands to Hedera as Bitcoin liquidity flows into new DeFi rails
Several crypto exchanges have launched variations of wrapped Bitcoin, including Kraken Wrapped BTC (KBTC), Gate Wrapped BTC (GTBTC), Binance Wrapped BTC (BBTC), Huobi BTC (HBTC) and OKX Wrapped BTC (XBTC), but their market caps are a fraction of the two leaders.
The total combined supply of wBTC and cbBTC stands at roughly 208,000 BTC, according to CoinGecko.
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