Stablecoin Issuer Circle To Issue New Privacy Coin ‘USDCx’ In Partnership With Layer-1 Chain Aleo: Report

The crypto giant Circle has reportedly partnered with the layer-1 privacy blockchain Aleo to launch a new stablecoin that can address privacy concerns among businesses and private individuals. 

The private version of the dollar-pegged stablecoin USDC aims to obscure transaction histories, reports Fortune, citing information from Aleo co-founder Howard Wu.

Says Wu,

“People don’t want to reveal their business revenues. They don’t want to reveal business intelligence. But the way that transparent blockchains work today unfortunately means that every time you transact, you are leaking that data.”

Wu says the stablecoin called USDCx won’t be truly private. Public users who check the blockchain log will only see unintelligible data but every transaction of the token includes a compliance record that Circle can access in case authorities ask for information.

“This is banking-level privacy, as opposed to ‘privacy privacy.”

Wu has seen interest in privacy-enabled stablecoins from potential customers that include crypto payroll processors Request Finance and Toku.

He says that prediction markets through which gamblers can place bets on real-world events and sports are also interested in experimenting with stablecoins like USDCx.

Privacy-focused cryptocurrencies such as Zcash already exist but they are more volatile than stablecoins whose value is pegged to an underlying asset.

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