• Circle's October 16, 2026 blog post says about 59 cents of each first-half 2026 revenue dollar went to distribution partners and transaction costs.
• About 34 cents per dollar was reinvested in licenses, banking, settlement liquidity, compliance and products, leaving about 7 cents of net profit, per Circle.
• The post does not split the roughly $819 million between partner payments and transaction costs, so the partner share cannot be isolated from it.
• CoinDesk reports that Open USD and the Paxos-led Global Dollar Network pass reserve income to participants, which puts the partner share at the center of the competition.
• Watch whether distributors weigh a larger reserve-income share against Circle's near-real-time redemption through Circle Payments Network.

Circle is arguing that most of USDC's economics already flow to the partners that distribute it. In an October 16, 2026 blog post, Chief Commercial Officer Kash Razzaghi said about 59 cents of every first-half 2026 revenue dollar went to partners and transaction costs, and Circle kept about 7 cents as net profit. The figures are Circle's own and unaudited in the post, and they arrive as newer stablecoins court the same partners.

Where the revenue went

Circle's disclosure puts partner payments at the center of USDC's economics. In the post, Circle said about $819 million of roughly $1.4 billion in first-half 2026 revenue, about 59 cents per dollar, went to distribution partners and transaction costs. Another $473 million, about 34 cents, was reinvested in licenses, banking relationships, settlement liquidity, compliance, new products and blockchain integrations. The post does not split the $819 million between partner payments and transaction costs, which limits how far the figure can be read as a pure revenue share.

Rivals pass reserve income to participants

The challenge comes from stablecoins that share reserve income and charge less to move in and out. CoinDesk reports that Open USD, backed by Coinbase, Stripe and BlackRock, lets businesses mint and redeem without fees and passes reserve income to participants minus a management fee, and that the Paxos-led Global Dollar Network's USDG shares income too. CoinDesk says Circle's post did not name Open USD. Circle's post names Coinbase as its largest long-standing partner; neither source sizes what Coinbase receives.

Circle's defense is the cost of redemption

Circle's defense is that redemption is not free to provide. Its post says every customer can redeem USDC for free, with standard banking-rail redemptions typically settling in up to two business days, and that Circle Payments Network users can redeem for free in near real time, with Circle carrying the liquidity cost. CoinDesk quotes the post: the costs of redemption, compliance and resilience do not disappear just because the issuer declined to pay them. That argument is Circle's own and is not tested by either source.

For payments operators the question is the take rate. A distributor choosing between USDC and a yield-sharing coin is comparing its reserve-income share against settlement speed and redemption assurance. Circle's figures show the margin it is defending is thin by its own account, but the post does not show how partner terms differ across the 150-plus partners it describes. The next partner renewals, and whether Circle's retained share moves, will show whether the pressure is real.