According to Wu, Arc stated that in Circle's 2026 first batch of Developer Grant projects, nearly half of the teams are from Africa or the Global South, covering places like Lagos, Nairobi, Accra, and Durban. This outcome wasn’t intentionally planned but stems from local teams focusing on addressing real-world needs such as cross-border payments, remittances, SME financing, forex exchange, merchant payments, and stablecoin-native banking.