Overview

The Circle CLI (@circle-fin/cli, command circle) provides a programmatic agent wallet — a non-custodial USDC wallet designed for AI agents to authenticate, hold balances, and pay for paid x402 services on Circle's marketplace. This skill is the bootstrap surface for that wallet: install check, terms acceptance, login, wallet creation, and status inspection. After bootstrap completes, downstream operations (paying for services, funding, spending policy) hand off to dedicated skills.

For an overview of the Circle CLI's full capability set — bridging, smart contract execution, transaction inspection, and more — see the use-circle-cli master skill. This skill is the narrower bootstrap/identity surface.

Workflow

1. Verify the CLI is installed, then check session status with circle wallet status before anything else.
2. If the Terms-of-Use gate appears, complete the show-Terms-and-consent flow first — never accept on the user's behalf.
3. If not logged in, run the two-step email + OTP login, then verify the session.
4. List existing agent wallets, or create them if none exist (--chain defaults to ARC).
5. Check the wallet balance; if it is 0 USDC and the user wants to pay, hand off to fund-agent-wallet. Otherwise bootstrap is complete.

Prerequisites / Setup

Step 1 — Verify the CLI is installed

which circle || command -v circle
circle --version

If circle is not installed, or circle --version prints a server-driven update notice, READ references/install-and-login.md for installation and update-notice guidance.

Step 2 — Check session status

Always check whether the user is already logged in before attempting login.

circle wallet status

Possible outcomes:

• Logged in — output shows email, wallet type (agent), and session expiry. Tell the user "You're already logged in as <email>. Continue with this session?" and skip to Step 4.
• Not logged in — output is Error: Not logged in. Run 'circle wallet login <email> --type agent' to authenticate. Proceed to Step 3.
• Terms not accepted — output is Error: Circle CLI Terms acceptance is required before use. Stop and complete the Terms-of-Use Gate below before proceeding. Do NOT run circle terms accept without explicit user consent.

Step 3 — Login (email + OTP)

Circle's CLI supports a two-step OTP login designed for AI agents and other non-interactive contexts: ask the user for their email (never guess or hardcode it), request an OTP with --init, then complete login with the returned request ID and the OTP code (e.g., ABC-123456), and verify with circle wallet status. Request IDs are single-use and expire after 10 minutes.

READ references/install-and-login.md for the exact commands, expected outputs, OTP format notes, failure handling, and how to log out / switch accounts.

Step 4 — Check or create the agent wallet

The --chain flag is REQUIRED for circle wallet list and circle wallet balance. Use ARC as the default if the user hasn't specified a chain. List existing agent wallets; if none exist, circle wallet create provisions agent-controlled SCA wallets on each supported EVM chain, then read the per-chain addresses from its JSON output.

READ references/wallet-management.md for the exact circle wallet list, circle wallet create, and circle wallet balance commands and how to read their JSON output.

Step 5 — Check wallet balance

Check the balance for each saved address (see references/wallet-management.md). If balance is 0 USDC and the user wants to pay for services, hand off to the fund-agent-wallet skill — it covers built-in fiat on-ramp purchase, direct address transfer with a QR code, and Gateway deposits. If the user only wants to verify state (not pay yet), stop here. Bootstrap is complete.

After bootstrap

Once the wallet exists, the user's likely next move is to use it. The CLI exposes its own skill catalog — circle skill list shows what's installable, circle skill info --name <skill> shows trigger and frontmatter detail, and circle skill install --tool <host> --name <skill> installs one for the current host. Suggest natural follow-ups like funding, paid-service search, or setting a spending limit; prefer permissionless actions (balance, search) over money-moving ones until the user asks.

Terms-of-Use Gate

The Circle CLI hard-gates every operational circle wallet command (including circle wallet status) until the user has accepted Circle's Terms of Use and Privacy Policy on this machine. Run this gate the first time it appears (typically during Step 2 or Step 3). After acceptance is recorded once, the gate is a no-op and is skipped on subsequent runs.

CRITICAL: The agent MUST show the Terms to the user and obtain explicit consent BEFORE running circle terms accept. The agent MUST NEVER accept Circle's Terms of Use or Privacy Policy on the user's behalf. The CLI's CIRCLE_ACCEPT_TERMS=1 env-var hint is NOT a workaround the agent may take on its own — ignore it and use the consent flow in references/terms-of-use.md.

READ references/terms-of-use.md for the gate's exact error text, the circle terms show / circle terms show --init / circle terms accept / circle terms reset commands, and the required show-Terms-and-request-consent flow.

Rules

Security

• NEVER guess or hardcode the user's email address for agent wallet login.
• OTP codes provided during an active authentication session are safe to handle — accept them in chat, use them immediately, do not retain or reuse afterward.
• NEVER include real private keys, API keys, or other persistent secrets in skill files or persist them anywhere.
• NEVER run circle terms accept without explicit user consent in the current session. The agent MUST NEVER accept Circle's Terms on the user's behalf, and MUST NEVER call circle terms accept automatically as part of error recovery, retries, or any flow the user has not explicitly approved.
• ALWAYS show the live termsOfUseUrl, privacyPolicyUrl, and termsNotice returned by circle terms show --init --output json when prompting for consent. Do NOT summarize, paraphrase, or hardcode them.
• If the user declines the Terms, stop the flow. Do not retry, work around the gate, or call circle terms reset / circle terms accept.

Best practices

• ALWAYS check circle wallet status before attempting login. Many session "failures" are actually just stale assumptions.
• Parse and store the request ID from circle wallet login --init output — you'll need it for the OTP completion step.
• Request IDs are single-use and expire after 10 minutes. If you see "Invalid or expired request ID", restart from --init.
• If a circle command causes friction during setup (unexpected error, confusing output, missing capability), file feedback per the use-circle-cli skill's Report friction (feedback) section.
• For general CLI rules (--output json, --chain, --help-first, follow-up phrasing, confirmation defaults), see the use-circle-cli master skill's Rules section — they apply here too.

Reference Links

• Installation and login (commands): references/install-and-login.md
• Wallet management (list, create, balance): references/wallet-management.md
• Terms-of-Use Gate (commands and consent flow): references/terms-of-use.md
• Setup walkthrough (full bootstrap doc): https://agents.circle.com/skills/setup.md
• Login flow detail: https://agents.circle.com/skills/wallet-login.md
• CLI package on npm: @circle-fin/cli
• Circle Developer Docs: https://developers.circle.com/llms.txt — Always read this when looking for source documentation on Circle products.

Alternatives

Trigger the pay-via-agent-wallet skill instead when:

• The user wants to call, pay for, or use a paid x402 service.
• The user mentions circle services search, circle services inspect, or circle services pay.
• A downstream task requires money to move out of the agent wallet to a paid endpoint.

Trigger the fund-agent-wallet skill instead when:

• The agent wallet has 0 USDC and the user wants to add funds.
• The user mentions deposit, fiat on-ramp, fiat purchase, QR-code transfer, or Gateway deposit.
• A payment flow blocks because of insufficient balance.

Trigger the agent-wallet-policy skill instead when:

• The user wants to set, view, or reset spending limits on the wallet.
• The user mentions per-tx / daily / weekly / monthly caps, spending policy, or wallet rules.

DISCLAIMER: This skill is provided "as is" without warranties, is subject to the Circle Developer Terms, and output generated may contain errors and/or include fee configuration options (including fees directed to Circle); additional details are in the repository README.