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1. Extended's move from Starknet to Arc
Extended, a decentralized perpetual futures exchange, is moving its settlement layer from Starknet to Arc, the blockchain developed by stablecoin issuer Circle. The company announced the plan on October 8, with the migration set for this week. Trading is to continue, while deposits and withdrawals pause for up to two hours. Holders of USDT and wBTC had to act by 12:00 UTC on October 21.
The change affects where the exchange's trades are ultimately recorded and where user collateral is held. It also reshapes which assets Extended can support, since two widely used tokens will not exist on the new network.
2. What is changing for Extended users?
For most traders the transition is designed to be invisible. Extended has said that accounts, sub-accounts, positions, orders, transaction history, points and keys will remain unchanged after the move. Trading is to carry on while the settlement layer is switched, and the only planned interruption is a pause in deposits and withdrawals lasting up to roughly two hours.
That distinction matters. A perpetual futures exchange lets traders hold leveraged positions with no expiry date, and continuous uptime is central to the product, because open positions can be liquidated if prices move sharply. Keeping the order book live during a migration of the underlying settlement network is therefore an operational priority, and the short deposit and withdrawal window is the compromise Extended has chosen.
Users who held only supported assets and have no particular concerns need to take no action, according to the exchange's plan. Those holding USDT or wBTC were in a different position and were asked to act before the deadline.
3. What happens to USDT and wBTC balances?
Neither Tether's USDT nor wrapped bitcoin (wBTC) will exist on Arc, so Extended set a deadline of 12:00 UTC on October 21 for users holding more than $1 of either asset to convert or withdraw. Balances could be converted one-to-one, with USDT becoming USDC and wBTC becoming cirBTC, and no exchange fee charged for the conversion.
USDC is Circle's own dollar stablecoin, which makes it the natural unit of account on a chain that Circle built. The cirBTC token is the bitcoin-linked asset available on Arc as a counterpart to wBTC. For a trader, the practical effect is that collateral denominated in USDT or wBTC has to be swapped into assets that the new network recognizes.
The exchange also set out consequences for missing the cutoff. Users who failed to convert or withdraw by the deadline face account restrictions, under which positions are closed at the mark price without fees and open orders are cancelled. That rule exists to prevent balances in unsupported assets from being left stranded when the settlement layer changes.
4. What is Arc and who is behind it?
Arc is a Layer 1 blockchain created by Circle, the company that issues USDC. A Layer 1 is a base network that processes and finalizes its own transactions, as opposed to a Layer 2 or application-specific chain that inherits security from another network. Circle designed Arc around stablecoin use, which is why USDC plays the central role there.
Starknet, where Extended currently settles, is a different kind of network. It is an Ethereum-linked scaling system that uses zero-knowledge proofs to batch transactions. Extended began on that infrastructure and, moved from the earlier StarkEx technology to Starknet as planned in 2025. The new migration is therefore the second major change of settlement infrastructure in a relatively short period.
By moving to Arc, Extended shifts from a general-purpose scaling network to a chain run by a single stablecoin issuer. Whether that trade-off is worthwhile depends on how traders weigh the benefits of tighter alignment with USDC against the reduction in diversity of the surrounding ecosystem.
5. Why would a perpetuals exchange change settlement networks?
A settlement layer is where final balances are recorded and where deposits and withdrawals are processed. For an exchange like Extended, it determines which assets can be used as collateral, how quickly funds can move, what fees users pay to move them and how much trust must be placed in the network operator.
Choosing a chain tied to a stablecoin issuer has a clear logic for a product whose margin is dollar-denominated. If the primary collateral is USDC and the network itself is built by the issuer of USDC, the path between depositing and trading can be simpler. The exchange's decision to retire USDT and wBTC support reflects that alignment: it narrows the collateral menu to assets native to the new environment.
There are costs too. Narrowing the menu means that traders who prefer USDT or wBTC must convert, which can involve friction or taxable events depending on where they live, and the forced conversion is a reminder that infrastructure choices made by a platform can reshape what users hold.
6. What is the risk of concentration around one issuer?
Building on a chain created by one stablecoin issuer concentrates exposure. If USDC is the default dollar asset and Circle controls the network's design, then the exchange's operations depend more heavily on a single company's decisions, policies and technical roadmap than they would on a more neutral base layer.
That concentration is not necessarily a flaw, and many financial products rest on a single dominant provider. It does, however, change the risk profile. Traders and counterparties considering Extended will want to weigh how decisions on the Arc network, such as upgrades or issuer-level controls over USDC, could feed through to the exchange.
Neither Extended nor the available public information suggests that such issues have arisen. The point is structural: when the settlement layer, the main collateral asset and the network operator are linked, it becomes more important to understand how they relate to each other.
7. How does the move fit into the wider market?
Decentralized perpetuals trading has become a competitive corner of crypto, with several platforms vying for volume by offering different combinations of speed, collateral options and decentralization. Where a platform settles is one of the levers it can adjust to differentiate itself.
Extended's decision shows that the choice is not permanent. The exchange was founded by a team with a background at Revolut and went live on Starknet in August 2025, and within about fourteen months it is changing foundations again. Such moves signal that platforms are willing to re-architect their infrastructure when a different network seems better matched to their customers.
For Circle, an established trading venue adopting Arc is a useful early demonstration of the network in use, since a perpetuals exchange generates frequent transactions and holds meaningful collateral. For the broader market, it is one example of stablecoin issuers extending their reach from the token to the network that carries it.
8. How do perpetual futures and collateral work?
A perpetual future is a derivative contract that tracks the price of an asset without an expiry date. Traders post collateral, known as margin, and can open positions larger than that collateral by using leverage. A funding payment exchanged periodically between long and short traders keeps the contract price close to the underlying market price.
Because positions are leveraged, the collateral asset matters a great deal. If margin is held in a stablecoin pegged to the dollar, its value stays steady while the position moves. If margin is held in a volatile asset, a price drop can reduce the buffer protecting the position at the very moment it is needed. This is why a decision about which collateral to accept is one of the most consequential an exchange can make.
On a decentralized exchange, margin is held in smart contracts or a settlement system the platform relies on, rather than in accounts controlled solely by a company. The settlement network therefore also determines how those funds are secured and how they can be withdrawn, which explains why the migration involves a temporary pause on moving money in and out.
9. What does a migration like this test?
Moving a live exchange between settlement networks is technically demanding. Balances must be reconciled so that every user's holdings on the old network match what is recorded on the new one, open positions must carry over without being altered, and the order book has to remain available while the underlying plumbing changes.
Each of those steps is a potential point of failure, which is why platforms typically announce deadlines, pause transfers briefly and set rules for balances that do not fit the new design. Extended's approach follows that pattern: a published cutoff for unsupported assets, a limited pause for deposits and withdrawals, and a commitment that accounts, positions and history remain intact.
For users, the reassuring signs will be ordinary ones. Positions that look the same before and after, withdrawals that resume on time and balances that match expectations would indicate that the transition went as planned.
10. What should traders do and what comes next?
For anyone with positions on Extended, the instructions are straightforward. Confirm that no balance remains in USDT or wBTC, expect a deposit and withdrawal pause of up to about two hours during the move, and avoid scheduling transfers into or out of the exchange during that window.
Once the migration is complete, attention will turn to how the exchange performs on the new network: whether trading continues smoothly, whether deposits and withdrawals resume on schedule, and whether liquidity holds as collateral is consolidated into USDC. Extended has not published results of the transition, so those questions remain open until the move has been carried out.
Observers will also watch whether other platforms follow a similar path to chains operated by stablecoin issuers, which would indicate that Extended's decision reflects a wider trend rather than a one-off choice.