USDC has surpassed USDT in DeFi transaction volume, reaching $17.3 trillion compared to USDT's $12.9 trillion.
In a significant shift in the stablecoin landscape, USDC, issued by Circle, has surpassed USDT from Tether in transaction volume within decentralized finance (DeFi) activities over the past year.
Recent data from analytics platform Artemis reveals that USDC's transaction volume has reached an impressive $17.3 trillion, outpacing USDT's $12.9 trillion.
Despite this surge in transaction volume, USDT retains a dominant position in market capitalization, valued at $186 billion, compared to USDC's $74.9 billion.
Anthony Yim, co-founder of Artemis, highlighted that USDC is favored on DeFi platforms for its utility in automated lending and trading, while USDT is more commonly utilized for everyday transactions, business operations, and as a store of value.
Overall, the stablecoin market has seen a substantial increase, with total transaction volume in 2025 rising by 72% to $33 trillion. The fourth quarter of the previous year alone recorded a turnover of $11 trillion, up from $8.8 trillion in the preceding quarter.
Looking ahead, analysts from Bloomberg Intelligence project that the total volume in the stablecoin sector could soar to $56 trillion by 2030.
In December, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) initiated a pilot program under the GENIUS Act, enabling the use of digital assets as collateral in derivatives markets, with Bitcoin, Ethereum, and USDC being the initial acceptable collateral assets. Concurrently, Visa began facilitating transactions in USDC for U.S. banks.
