Dublin law firm Matheson is advising Circle on a new $9bn transaction to go public through an arrangement with NYSE listed SPAC, Concord Acquisition Corp.
The deal involving Circle Internet Financial Ltd was originally announced in July 2021. The new agreement sets Circle's enterprise value at $9bn, increased from the $4.5bn originally announced last year.
Circle is a global financial technology firm that enables businesses of all sizes to harness the power of digital currencies and public blockchains for payments, commerce and financial applications worldwide.
Circle is the issuer of USD Coin (USDC), a dollar-linked digital currency used for internet commerce and payments.
Circle claims that each USDC is backed by a dollar held in reserve, or by other ‘approved investments’. Wikipedia explains that the tokenization of the US Dollar into USD Coin happens in a three-step process:
In Association with
+ A user sends US dollars to the coin issuer's bank account.
+ The issuer uses a USD Coin smart contract to create the equivalent amount of USD Coin.
+ The newly minted USD Coins are sent to the user and the substituted US dollars are held in a reserve.
The redemption of USD Coins for US Dollars follows the process listed above but in reverse.
According to Matheson, under the terms of the new agreement the holding company that was set up in connection with the original business combination will acquire both Concord and Circle and become a publicly-traded business.
The new agreement replaces the prior business combination agreement, which for a variety of reasons outside of the parties’ control could not be completed by the termination date of 3 April 2022.
The new agreement has an initial outside date of 8 December 2022 with the potential to extend such date to 31 January 2023 under certain circumstances.
The Matheson team led by partners Fergus Bolster, David Jones, Susanne McMenamin, John Ryan, Aidan Fahy and Pat English, was assisted by solicitor colleagues Grainne Boyle, Conor Bates, Anna O’Carroll, Cillian Dervan and Kevin Lavin.
