Mercado Libre, Circle expand into Chile with USDC

Mercado Libre continues its venture into offering crypto for Latin Americans, this time partnering with Circle

article-image

Sergei Elagin/Shutterstock modified by Blockworks

share

Latin American digital payment platform Mercado Pago is now offering USDC payments for customers in Chile, Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire announced Tuesday on X, formerly Twitter.

Allaire called Mercado Libre, the e-commerce firm that runs Mercado Pago, the Amazon of Latin America. 

In a more detailed blog post, senior director of Mercado Pago Matías Spagui lauded this integration as a way for millions of people in Chile to access its stablecoin.

“With the launch of this stablecoin we seek to diversify access to cryptocurrencies and offer the more than two million Mercado Pago users an alternative that matches the value of the dollar,” Spagui said in a statement.

Allaire mentioned that this move into Chile essentially capitalizes on what the company already knows about its customers and the stablecoin business in general.

The majority of stablecoin activity — specifically USDC transactions — happens outside the US, where the US dollar makes up for around 96% of trade invoicing, according to the Federal Reserve.

“We recently shared that ~70% of USDC adoption was non-US, and a lot of that is driven by emerging markets. Latin American [fintechs] will be a major driving force in the adoption of digital dollars,” Allaire posted on X. 

Mercado Libre, the firm Circle is partnering with to get more widespread USDC access to Chilean citizens, hasn’t been shy in the crypto space. 

The company launched Ethereum-based token MercadoCoin in Brazil last August as an alternate means to earn cashback on purchases made through its e-commerce platform.


Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

Tags

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

Industry City | Brooklyn, NY

TUES - THURS, JUNE 24 - 26, 2025

Permissionless IV serves as the definitive gathering for crypto’s technical founders, developers, and builders to come together and create the future.If you’re ready to shape the future of crypto, Permissionless IV is where it happens.

Brooklyn, NY

SUN - MON, JUN. 22 - 23, 2025

Blockworks and Cracked Labs are teaming up for the third installment of the Permissionless Hackathon, happening June 22–23, 2025 in Brooklyn, NY. This is a 36-hour IRL builder sprint where developers, designers, and creatives ship real projects solving real problems across […]

recent research

Research Report Templates.png

Research

The convergence of DePIN and energy generation aims to address modern grid challenges by incentivizing distributed generation.

article-image

However, they noted there’s now an increased risk that unemployment and inflation will rise in the coming months. 

article-image

The network’s most ambitious upgrade since the Merge brings validator streamlining, smart account UX and doubled blobspace to Ethereum

article-image

Debate over extra Bitcoin use cases has returned, two years on from Ordinals

article-image

Altcoin season may be on a permanent pause as the market matures and paths grow more selective

article-image

Today’s blockchains are more like nervous systems without a brain — wiring without will

article-image

A number of blockchains make use of the Solana Virtual Machine