Arc Mainnet, AI Agents, and Tokenized Markets | Nikhil Chandhok, CTO of Circle

Circle just launched Arc Mainnet, and its ambition is much bigger than putting USDC on another blockchain. Circle Chief Product and Technology Officer Nikhil Chandhok joins David on launch day to unpack the vision for an “economic OS” built around fast settlement, stablecoin gas, privacy, and institutional-grade financial infrastructure. --- 📣SPOTIFY PREMIUM RSS FEED | USE CODE: SPOTIFY24 https://bankless.cc/spotify-premium --- BANKLESS SPONSOR TOOLS: 🔓NEAR | TRADE CONFIDENTIALLY, GET 20% BACK https://bankless.cc/near2026 🎯THE DEFI REPORT | ONCHAIN INSIGHTS https://thedefireport.io/bankless 👑BANKLESS CONTENT MCP https://www.bankless.com/premium --- TIMESTAMPS 0:00 Arc Mainnet Is Live 2:57 The “Economic OS” Vision 5:29 Validators, Privacy and Post-Quantum Security 8:27 How Private Is Arc? 12:24 Immutability and the Lazarus Test 16:14 What Gets Built on Arc First? 19:19 AI Agents Become Economic Actors 26:45 Agentic Commerce Gets Real 33:17 Reputation, Nano-Payments and Agent Credit 36:37 Tokenized Stocks and 24/7 Markets 39:59 Solving the On-Ramp and FX Problem 47:39 What Happens After Launch Day? 49:16 Closing Thoughts --- RESOURCES Nikhil Chandhok https://x.com/chandhok Arc https://www.arc.io/ --- Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here: https://www.bankless.com/disclosures