Circle's Stablecoin Pitchman Joins Blockchain Startup Celo

Chuck Kimble, head of financial institution (FI) partnerships at Circle, has left the company for a similar role at another blockchain startup, Celo.

As Celo's new head of strategic partnerships, Kimble will be helping the digital payments company "to bring better financial products to emerging markets and under-served populations around the world," the company said in a press release.

“Chuck brings a ton of business development and digital payments experience to Celo and he’ll play an instrumental role in encouraging the development and scaling of products globally,” Celo founder Rene Reinsberg said. “Chuck is highly respected in the financial tech industry and he understands how digital payment services can help people and families with no access to financial services.”

Kimble joined Circle in June of last year. During his tenure at the crypto trading and payments firm, he led business development and promotion of USDC, a cryptocurrency designed to hold its value with the U.S. dollar, or stablecoin.

Naeem Ishaq, Circle's Chief Financial Officer, told CoinDesk:

"Chuck joined Circle to lead our FI partnerships efforts and participate in a variety of projects, including work on the adoption of USDC. In his short time with the company, he helped to drive USDC adoption across a diverse cross-section of the crypto industry."

USDC is now the second-largest stablecoin by market capitalization and the No. 19 cryptocurrency overall, according to CoinMarketCap.

Payments veteran

Before Circle, Kimble spent three years at Dashlane, the maker of a password manager and digital wallet application.

He also worked for three years at Square and oversaw partnerships at Visa, supervising the company's teams in New York, Miami, Singapore and London, with responsibility for account strategy, business planning, recruiting and coaching, according to his LinkedIn profile.

“I’ve spent the vast majority of my career advancing digital payments and I see tremendous opportunity for Celo to improve the livelihood of billions of people around the world who today are involuntarily detached from the global financial system,” Kimble said in Celo's press release.

In September, Celo added another top manager to its team when former Ripple general counsel Brynly Llyr joined the startup in the same role.

Celo's investors include Polychain Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Coinbase Ventures and Square founder Jack Dorsey.

Chuck Kimble image courtesy of Celo

UPDATE (6, February 20:00 UTC): An earlier version of this article misdescribed Kimble’s work at Circle. He helped "develop" the business around the USDC stablecoin by promoting it to other companies, but he did not build the coin itself. Also, his official title at Circle was head of financial institution partnerships – not all partnerships, as his new employer Celo phrased it in a press release.