“On stage at Converge22 today, Circle announced an accelerated crypto payments roadmap enhanced by the recent acquisition of Elements, a merchant and developer-first payments orchestration platform. The announcement includes plans to quickly scale payment offerings to unlock utility value for crypto and lower the barrier of entry for merchants to access next-gen payments and financial services. The new payment offerings make it simple for merchants to integrate their existing PSP relationships with Circle’s crypto payment offerings.”

“The Federal Reserve’s decision to start raising rates has a surprising beneficiary: a cryptocurrency startup. The new rate outlook helped crypto firm Circle Internet Financial Ltd. boost the valuation of its pending merger with a special-purpose acquisition company to $9 billion. Circle issues a so-called stablecoin, called USD Coin or USDC, that is a popular vehicle to buy crypto because it is pegged to the U.S. dollar.”

“Despite being a year of decline for the crypto sector as a whole, 2018 was a banner year for Circle. In February the company acquired Poloniex, a troubled exchange whose reputation Circle is working hard to rehabilitate, for a reported $400 million. The following month it launched Circle Invest, a product that allows users to buy and sell 12 (at the time of writing) of the most well-known cryptocurrencies.”

“Blockchain startup Circle is adding the privacy-focused cryptocurrency monero to its Invest application, the company announced Monday. Just one week after the payment platform announced it was adding zcash to its trading app, the company added monero, according to a blog post. As with the other tokens available on the app, users will be able to purchase or invest the cryptocurrency.”