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Transaction fees on Arc are denominated in dollars, not a volatile asset. USDC, EURC, and USYC are integrated at the protocol level. No bridging or wrapping is required.

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USDC as the native gas token

On most EVM blockchains, a volatile token (such as ETH) serves as the native asset for gas fees and value transfer. Arc replaces this with USDC. Every transaction fee, native balance, and native transfer on Arc is denominated in USDC. This means:
  • Fees are predictable in dollar terms.
  • You hold a single asset for both gas and application-level transfers.
  • There is no need to acquire or manage a separate gas token.

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Two interfaces, one balance

USDC on Arc has two interfaces that share the same underlying balance: The native representation uses 18 decimals, consistent with how ETH works on Ethereum. The ERC-20 interface at 0x3600000000000000000000000000000000000000 uses 6 decimals to match the standard USDC representation on other EVM networks. This design also affects how DeFi protocols should handle USDC on Arc. On other EVM blockchains, a WETH-style wrapper contract gives the native asset an ERC-20 interface. On Arc, USDC is the native token and already has a built-in ERC-20 interface. The wrapping step does not exist; protocols should use this address directly. No wrapper is deployed or supported. Don’t alias the EIP-7528 native-asset sentinel (0xEeeeeEeeeEeEeeEeEeEeeEEEeeeeEeeeeeeeEEeE) that DeFi SDKs use in routing tables as a stand-in for native ETH to this address: aliasing it conflates native value transfers with ERC-20 transfers. For the protocol-level details, see EVM differences. This native asset design behaves differently from other EVM chains in ways that can break common assumptions:
  • USDC.balanceOf(addr) (6 decimals) and addr.balance / eth_getBalance (18 decimals) represent the same underlying balance. The ERC-20 interface truncates the last 12 decimal places of the native value; amounts smaller than 1×10⁻⁶ USDC are not represented in balanceOf but are still present in the native balance.
  • Transfers through either interface affect the same underlying balance.
  • A native transfer can revert even with a sufficient balance, for example because of the blocklist or zero-address rules.
If you’re porting an existing contract, see the Porting contracts to Arc checklist and value transfer rules for the full set of differences. For fee parameters and gas pricing details, see Gas and fees. For the rationale behind stable fee denomination, see Stable fee design.

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Indexing USDC movements

Every USDC send, ERC-20 transfer, mint, and burn emits a Transfer log (18 decimals) from the system emitter, Arc’s EIP-7708 implementation. Gas deductions don’t emit events. The ERC-20 USDC contract additionally logs its own Transfer (6 decimals) for ERC-20-interface activity, so a single ERC-20 transfer emits both; match on the emitter address to avoid double-counting. For the full event reference, including emitter addresses, the mint and burn mapping, and legacy native events, see USDC system events. For a step-by-step walkthrough, see Index Arc events.

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Natively supported stablecoins

Beyond USDC, Arc natively supports additional stablecoin assets at the protocol level, meaning they are deployed as pre-configured contracts at genesis, not bridged or wrapped from other blockchains.

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EURC

EURC is Circle’s euro-denominated stablecoin. It is deployed as a standard ERC-20 token on Arc with 6 decimals, enabling euro-denominated payments, FX workflows, and multi-currency applications without relying on third-party bridges. For the EURC contract address, see Contract addresses.

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USYC

USYC is a yield-bearing token representing shares of a tokenized money market fund, a regulated investment vehicle that holds short-duration U.S. Treasury securities and distributes yield to token holders. It provides onchain access to regulated, low-risk yield for institutional participants. USYC is only accessible to institutions outside the United States, subject to eligibility restrictions and a $100,000 USD minimum investment. For token addresses and testnet faucet instructions, see Contract addresses.

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Design rationale

Arc’s stablecoin-native model is a deliberate architectural choice, not a compatibility layer added after launch. Three principles guided the design.

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No volatile native token

Traditional blockchains require users to hold a volatile native token to pay fees. This creates friction for financial applications: users must acquire the token, manage price exposure, and convert between the fee token and the assets they actually want to use. Arc eliminates this by making USDC the native token from day one.

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Single gas denomination at launch

Arc launches with USDC as the sole gas token rather than supporting multi-token gas payments from the start. A single denomination simplifies the fee market, avoids oracle dependencies for gas price conversion, and keeps the protocol’s economic model straightforward. Multi-stablecoin gas payment through paymasters (smart contracts that sponsor or redirect gas fees on behalf of a user) is not supported at launch.

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Stablecoins as first-class primitives

USDC, EURC, and USYC are not tokens added after launch. They are integrated at the protocol level, which means applications can compose across stable assets with consistent interfaces and without external dependencies. This positions Arc as infrastructure specifically designed for payments, lending, FX, and treasury management.