HostUSDC vs MUSD — price, size and safety, side by side
USDC (Solana) vs MUSD (Monad) — every figure is the freshest dated measurement we hold for that token, never a live-feed guess. Prices stamped 2026-10-17 / 2026-10-16.
USDC vs MUSD — normalized performance, 2026-09-15 to 2026-10-16T21:15:32
| USDC | MUSD | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $0.9998 | $1.00 |
| Market cap | $8.60B | $37.66M |
| 24h volume | $1.90B DEX | $7.62M DEX |
| Liquidity | $464.95M | $1.74M |
| FDV | $8.60B | $22.12M |
| Holders | 5,248,202 | 10,151 |
| Age (days) | — | 144 |
| Safety grade | A | B |
Where they differ
- USDC measures ~228× the market cap of MUSD
- USDC measures ~266× the liquidity of MUSD
- USDC measures ~249× the 24h volume of MUSD
- USDC measures ~517× the holder count of MUSD
What the data says
USDC
USDC is the dollar most of Solana actually trades in, and judging it takes a different lens than the one that works on memecoins. This is a centralized, fiat-backed stablecoin: Circle issues it, holds the reserves behind it, and publishes monthly attestations of those reserves. On Solana it lives at mint EPjFWdd5AufqSSqeM2qN1xzybapC8G4wEGGkZwyTDt1v, where the October 6, 2026 snapshot records about $8.6 billion of market capitalization, roughly 5.25 million holders, and around $465 million of tracked pool liquidity — the deepest dollar venue on the chain.
Here is the part that confuses people who learned token safety from rug-checkers: USDC's mint and freeze authorities are live, on purpose, permanently. Circle has to mint new USDC when dollars come in and burn it when they go out — that is what "backed" means mechanically — and it maintains the ability to freeze addresses to comply with sanctions and court orders, which it has used. On a memecoin, a live mint authority is the classic rug lever; on a fiat-backed stablecoin it is the product working as designed. The risk hasn't vanished — it has moved from an anonymous deployer to a regulated company, which is a trade most holders are knowingly making.
MUSD
MUSD — MetaMask's USD — is the wallet's own stablecoin: a dollar token aimed at the place its users already live, issued through the M0 infrastructure stack and meant to move between chains as one instrument. The deployment at 0xaca92e438df0b2401ff60da7e4337b687a2435da is on Monad, where our October 9, 2026 snapshot shows $1.7 million of tracked pool liquidity — among the deepest pools we measured on the chain.
What to be honest about: a wallet-issued stablecoin's strength is distribution — every MetaMask user is one tap from it — and its risk is concentration in the issuer's own stack. Backing, redemption and chain-deploy mechanics live with M0 and the contracts behind this address; our snapshot did not assess this deployment's contract-level controls, so the live scan is the place to verify before treating the label as the substance.
FAQ
Which is bigger, USDC or MUSD?
By tracked market cap: USDC (Solana) measures $8.60B and MUSD (Monad) measures $37.66M — dated snapshots, not a live feed.
Which is safer, USDC or MUSD?
On the contract checks we publish: USDC (Solana) grades A and MUSD (Monad) grades B. A grade is a structural check on the contract, not a promise about the asset.
How have USDC and MUSD performed over the shared window?
Between 2026-09-15 and 2026-10-16T21:15:32, the measured snapshots show USDC at +0.01% and MUSD at +0.05%.
The grade column is the one CMC's compare page cannot print — our grade is computed from the contract itself (mint/freeze authority, liquidity, holder concentration). Changes are measured over the shared window stated on the chart, 2026-09-15→2026-10-16T21:15:32; a token with fewer measured points measures a shorter span inside it.
Figures are dated on-chain snapshots, not a live feed. Safety grades are structural checks — not investment advice. Free · no signup · a HostDeFi product.