PANews reported on December 25th that Circle has clarified that a recent press release claiming the launch of its tokenized gold and silver trading platform, "CircleMetals," was false. Released just before Christmas, the press release forged the Circle brand and statements from executives, directing users to connect their wallets to participate in the exchange of USDC for gold (GLDC) and silver (SILC) tokens. Circle has confirmed that it has never launched this service, and the website has been taken offline. Circle reminds users to be vigilant and not to trust unverified links and wallet connection requests.