"CIRCLE Team Research: What Game Are These People Playing?"

Investment is about investing in people.

In the cryptocurrency industry, filled with maverick heroes and tech geeks, there is one company’s management team that stands out as incongruous.

If Tether is like a mysterious financial tycoon navigating in the gray area, then Circle is like an old-school banker in a tailored suit, briefcase in hand, lobbying on Capitol Hill in Washington. They don’t wear hoodies, don’t shout "To the Moon", and even deliberately maintain a demeanor that the crypto circle finds "boring". But it is precisely this boredom that may hold the greatest value.

It is this "boring" approach that allowed Circle to successfully list on the New York Stock Exchange in 2025, becoming the first publicly traded stablecoin company in the world.

There is an old saying in the investment world: "Investment is about investing in people, it’s about investing in teams."

Today, we will take a comprehensive look at Circle's core management team, to see what kind of background this group claims to be engaged in "internet currency protocols".

The leader is @jerallaire, a prophet who has accurately predicted the times three times.

At the age of 13, he began using quantitative thinking for value investment—like a baseball card version of Buffett.

His career can be summarized with three precise paradigm judgments:

First: In 1993, foresaw the internet

While studying political science and philosophy at Macalester College, his roommate worked in the campus IT department and pulled a high-speed internet line into their dorm. It was the early 1990s, and most people didn’t even know what a homepage was.

He invented ColdFusion—the world’s first commercial Web application server. It went public in 1999 and was acquired by Macromedia for $360 million in 2001.

Second: In 2004, saw online video

He added video playback capabilities to Flash Player. In 2004, he founded Brightcove, the world’s first internet video publishing platform. Its clients span over 100 countries, serving 25% of the video operations of the top 10,000 websites globally. It went public in 2012.

Third: In 2013, saw the next generation of currency

After the 2008 financial crisis, Allaire rekindled a keen interest in global political economy—this time not at an academic level. He began researching what went wrong with the global banking system and the fundamental flaws in the currency system.

After encountering Bitcoin in 2012, everything connected. He and old comrade Sean Neville conceptualized the prototype of Circle at the kitchen table in Allaire's home. In 2013, they secured $9 million from Jim Breyer, Accel Partners, and General Catalyst, officially founding Circle.

Three startups, three successes. This is extremely rare in the history of global entrepreneurship.

If it were merely about "having a good eye", Allaire would at most be a good trend analyst. What truly adds to his credit is his ability to navigate adversity.

Circle's history has certainly not been smooth sailing: it initially created a Bitcoin payment app (Circle Pay) and later pivoted to stablecoins; in the meantime, it acquired the exchange Poloniex, which it sold at a loss; it tried to go public via SPAC twice, with the first attempt cancelled by partners; in 2023, after the SVB collapse, $3.3 billion in USDC reserves were frozen, and USDC briefly broke its peg to $0.87—at that point, almost everyone thought Circle was finished.

He said, "No one believed me. But I pulled a lot of rabbits out of a hat."

He cut non-core businesses, laid off hundreds of people, maintained the skeleton for USDC operations, and ultimately succeeded in IPO in June 2025. Emerging from the valley of death, the share price rose from the IPO of $31 to nearly $200 at its highest.

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"Investment is about investing in people: What game are these people at Circle playing?"

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