USDC Boards Bre-B: Circle’s Colombia Pilot Hits the Instant-Payment Track

Circle and ACI Worldwide announced Tuesday a pilot in Colombia integrating USDC settlement with ACI Connetic, ACI’s cloud-based payments orchestration platform, and the country’s Bre-B instant-payments network. The trial will test account-to-account USDC settlement alongside traditional payment systems, creating what the companies call a multi-rail ecosystem.

ACI built the central infrastructure behind Bre-B, Colombia’s interoperable instant-payments network. Craig Ramsey, ACI’s global head of account-to-account payments, said, “The conversation around stablecoins is moving from possibility to practicality.” He described the effort as a way to integrate regulated stablecoins into workflows banks already trust.

Kash Razzaghi, Circle’s chief commercial officer, said financial institutions across Latin America are increasingly looking at how stablecoins can support the evolution of payments “within the infrastructure they already use,” framing USDC as a bridge between traditional finance and the digital economy.

The move extends Circle’s expansion into dozens of emerging markets and builds on the company’s Latin American presence following Mercado Pago’s addition of USDC in Argentina. The Colombia pilot is positioned as technology-agnostic: USDC is used in the trial, while ACI Connetic is built to support other payment networks and digital-asset providers over time.