Category: Tether

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Crypto News Stablecoins Tether

Stablecoin USDC Supply Has Been Growing Faster Than Tether in 2021

At the moment, Tether (USDT) is the largest stablecoin by supply. However, it has been losing out in supply growth to USD Coin (USDC), according to the “State of the Network” report by CoinMetrics. 

Tether vs USDC Supply Growth

Following the data on CoinMetrics, the total supply of USDC has risen over $22 billion, or about 57 percent since May and over 450 percent since the beginning of the year. In less than two weeks, USDC grew from a $15 billion USD asset on May 12 to over $20 billion USD. It’s worth mentioning that USDC is one of the fastest-growing stablecoins in the crypto market.

Two plausible factors driving more demand for USDC are market trust and the decentralized finance (DeFi) space. There is a possibility that USDC may soon catch up with USDT, provided the supply trend continues to increase.

USDT has only increased by over 190 percent in supply to a +$61 billion USD asset since the beginning of the year. Tron Network is currently the dominant blockchain for USDT, accounting for more than 50 percent of the entire USDT supply. There is now a lower supply of $30.9 billion USD (49 percent) on Ethereum, probably due to the expensive transaction fee on the blockchain, which led to the increase in demand on Tron. 

Notwithstanding the USDT supply and transaction count, the ERC-20 version of USDT sees more transfer value compared to the TRC-20 tokens, which indicates that both versions of USDT have different use cases, as per CoinMetrics.

BUSD Supply Increase Over 800% Since January

The Binance-backed BUSD is one other stablecoin in the spotlight. BUSD has risen by over 820 percent since the start of the year. There has been a strong demand for stablecoin amid the Binance DeFi space and the incredibly cheap transaction fee on the network. 

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Crypto News Stablecoins Tether

Market Cap of Stablecoins Has Surpassed $100 Billion USD

Market Cap of Stablecoins Has Surpassed $100 Billion USD

The market capitalization of stablecoins has surpassed $100 billion USD, according to market data from CryptoDiffer. As of May 25, stablecoins accounted for more than $86 billion USD in 24hrs trading volume.

Notably, there has been a consistent increase in demand for major stablecoins since the beginning of the year. These coins serve as the base currency for trading in exchange, as well as lending and borrowing on decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols.

Ten Largest Stablecoins by Market Capitalization

Following the information by CryptoDiffer the top ten stablecoins include:

USDT, USDC, and BUSD are some the most popular and traded stablecoins in the cryptocurrency market. They have a combined market capitalization of nearly $90 billion USD, which is about 88 percent of the entire stablecoin market valuation. Demand for stablecoins is increasing rapidly.

On Monday, Tether surpassed the $60 billion USD market cap. Demand for USDT has been increasing significantly in accordance with the entire growth of the cryptocurrency market. For reference, USDT had a market cap as low as $8 billion USD in May 2020, resulting in a 581 percent increase year over year when compared to the current record.

Also, the market capitalization of USDC increased from $18 billion to $20 billion USD within two weeks.

The Binance USD stablecoin has over $8 billion market capitalization, and a 24hrs trading volume of over $15 billion USD, according to CoinMarketCap.

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Crypto News Tether

Tether Finally Reveals Its Breakdown of USDT Reserve Backing

Tether Inc., the company behind the largest USD-backed stablecoin (USDT), has published a breakdown of asset categories that make up the stablecoin reserve. This is actually the first time the company reveals its reserve assets since the inception in 2014. 

Only 3.87% of USDT Reserve is Held in Cash

In the publication, Tether broke down its reserve assets into four categories. The majority of USDT reserves (75.85 percent) are held under the “Cash & Cash Equivalents & Other Short-Term Deposits  &  Commercial Paper” category. Further breakdown of this particular category shows that the company holds less cash reserve for the stablecoin. 

The allocation in this category is as follows:

  • Commercial Paper (65.39%) 
  • Fiduciary Deposits (24.20%) 
  • Cash (3.87%) 
  • Reverse Repo Notes (3.60%) 
  • Treasury Bills (2.94%)

The remaining 24 percent are held in Secured  Loans (12.55%), Corporate Bonds, Funds & Precious Metals (9.96%), and 1.64 percent in other investments that include cryptocurrencies.

Tether Commits to Ensuring Transparency of USDT

Having suffered several criticisms of market manipulation and shady reserve, Tether has since committed to ensuring transparency of its stablecoin. 

Today’s publication reflects our continued dedication to making this information public as part of our ongoing commitment to transparency and setting the standard in our industry. We embrace that commitment to our community.

Tether wrote. 

In March, Tether also released a transparency report which claimed that all USDT in circulation is fully backed by the reserve, as audited by Moore Cayman.

According to CoinMarketCap, there are currently 57,755,893,177 USDT in circulation, meaning that Tether holds over $57 billion USD in reserve for the coins.

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Coinbase Crypto News Stablecoins Tether

Coinbase Pro Delays Launch of USDT Trading Amid API Issues

Smartphone with Coinbase app logo and black keyboard on wooden background
Smartphone with Coinbase app logo and black keyboard on wooden background

US cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase recently announced it will debut Tether (USDT) trading on its trading platform, Coinbase Pro, this week. However, the launching of the stablecoin has been postponed till May 3, according to the exchange’s notice on Tuesday.

Coinbase Cites API Issues

In a tweet, the crypto exchange cited API issues, precisely saying that they are working to “make sure that we have fully remediated any issues on our core APIs and exchange”.  Besides the API issues, Coinbase is also preparing to bolster its trading platform to make it more robust for users while trading.

USDT trading was previously slated to open on April 26. Following the update, however, Coinbase Pro users are expected to start trading USDT next week.

Coinbase will support the ERC-20 version of USDT, which is based on Ethereum. It began accepting inbound transfers for the stablecoin immediately after the announcement last week.

Coinbase Could See Increases in Trading Volume

The addition of USDT on Coinbase Pro will expand its available coin trading pairs. Precisely, the exchange will support the following trading pairs: BTC-USDT, ETH-USDT, USDT-EUR, USDT-GBP, USDT-USD, and USDT-USDC.

At the time of writing, USDT is the largest and most-traded USD-backed stablecoin in the crypto market. Therefore it seems reasonable for Coinbase to plan scaling its trading platform ahead of the launching of USDT trading, as that could result in more more trading volume.

On Monday, the market capitalization of USDT in circulation crossed $50 billion USD. TRON is currently the largest blockchain network with the highest number of USDT.

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Cryptocurrencies Stablecoins Tether

Another $2 Billion USDT Minted At Tether Treasury

Tether – one of the biggest cryptocurrency stablecoins has minted another $2 billion USDT on the TRON blockchain.

A stablecoin is a new class of cryptocurrencies that price is pegged to an asset like the USD. For example, 1 USDT would equal 1 USD approximately.

What This Could Mean For USDT

Despite certain voices who have criticized Tether for a long time, asking whether USDT really is tied to the US Dollar or not – and how this tethering is actually ensured – Tether representatives and associates have gone on record in the past stating that every Tether token minted is actually backed by a reserve.

The above video is a podcast where Gregory Pepin – the CEO of Deltec bank – talks about the reserves backing USDT. Deltec is the Bahamas-based bank run by Tether Ltd., where their cash reserves are stored.

“We cannot take domestic customers and we cannot hold domestic Bahamian dollars. So that report is actually not relevant. And actually, if [the post’s author] took a little effort to go and dig a bit about the size of the Bahamian market of banking, [that person] would have found out that the entire mass of banks have around $200 billion in assets, I believe. And we are a part of that.”

Although any financial information, whether to do with crypto, fiat or both should be taken with a grain of salt, it’s worth noting that USDT is still one of the largest cryptocurrencies by market cap – so it’s quite possible that this minting is simply the result of new investors, or simply new funds that Tether Ltd. is putting to use. In addition, 2020 has seen the US Dollar ride quite a wave of inflation.

Overall, the minting of $2 billion worth of USDT should not be a cause for worry – but as always, be sure to perform careful research before making any investment.

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Crypto News Stablecoins Tether

Largest USD Stablecoin, Tether (USDT) to Launch on Polkadot and Kusama

Largest USD Stablecoin, Tether (USDT) to Launch on Polkadot and Kusama

Tether is planning to launch its US dollar-backed stablecoin on Kusama, which will be followed by Polkadot, a blockchain network that “facilitates an internet where independent blockchains can exchange information and transactions in a trustless way”.

Besides providing more scalability, part of the objective is to make USDT the first stablecoin that will exist on the Polkadot network, according to the CTO at Tether, Paolo Ardoino.

USDT to Launch on The First Polkadot Parachain

Before Polkadot, the stablecoin will initially go live on Kusama, which is considered a cousin network for Polkadot, basically serving as a preparation network for projects looking to run on Polkadot. USDT’s launch date on Polkadot is subject to the formation of the parachains. Tether wants the stablecoin to launch on the first common goods parachain, according to the CTO.

Tether will likely launch on the first parachain available, StateMint. We expect StateMint to be the first common goods parachain. […] Our integration with Polkadot serves to support the decentralized finance ecosystems that are growing across blockchains.”

Paolo Ardoino, CTO at Tether

USDT Allocation on Ethereum and Tron

Tether’s USDT is the largest and most liquid stablecoin in the crypto market. It’s already a multi-chain asset, and going live on Kusama and Polkadot would mark its ninth and tenth base blockchains, respectively. USDT is currently available on eight different blockchains, which include Ethereum, Tron, Bitcoin Cash’s Standard Ledger Protocol, Solana, EOS, Algorand, Liquid Network, and Omni.

However, the majority of USDT in circulation is currently available on Ethereum and Tron blockchain. According to the Etherscan, about 22.4 billion USDT have been issued on the Ethereum blockchain, and they are held in nearly three million addresses. On Tron however, there are 20.9 million USDT on the network.

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Crypto News Stablecoins Tether

Tether’s USDTs are Fully Backed, Moore Cayman Confirms After Audit

Tether's USDTs are Fully Backed, Moore Cayman Confirms After Audit

According to this announcement by Tether, third-party audit and assurance services provider Moore Cayman has confirmed USDTs in circulation are fully backed.

Over the recent years, many FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) stories have circulated in the cryptocurrency space concerning Tether’s asset reserves. Many people had argued that the company was only posting figures and that its US dollar-backed stablecoin (USDT) were not fully backed.

This controversy was mostly fuelled by the massive number of USDTs usually minted by Tether. Some people were concerned that the cryptocurrency market, especially Bitcoin (BTC), would crash if there were evidence that Tether’s assets are not fully backed. This announcement might help reduce all these FUDs and worries amongst crypto investors.

USDTs are Fully Backed by Tether Reserve

At the time of writing, there were over 40.6 billion USDTs in circulation, according to CoinMarketCap. Judging by Moore Cayman’s assurance report, it’s believed that Tether’s reserves back all these assets.

“Tether has always been fully backed, and the assurance opinion we made available today confirms it once again. As Tether’s growth in the market continues to validate our business, we understand the public’s interest in this matter and are pleased to share this attestation as part of our ongoing commitment to transparency,” Tether noted in the announcement.

USDT Remains the Largest Stablecoin

Stablecoins are backed by an asset, and USDT, in this case, is backed by the United States fiat currency. USDT is the largest and most-traded USD stablecoin in the crypto market. It has a market capitalization of over $40 billion, ranking as the fourth-largest digital currencies. 

The USD Coin (USDC) is the second-largest US dollar-backed stablecoin with over $10 billion in market capitalization. Recently, Visa added USDC as a settlement currency.

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Tether

Tether Receives Ransom Demand – Pay 500 BTC or Documents Will be Leaked

Tether publicly announced on March 1st that they received a ransom demand for 500 BTC ($24 Million USD) with the threat being a leak of documents aimed at harming the Bitcoin ecosystem.

They stated that they will not pay the ransom and the communications have been reported to law enforcement.

There have been rumours that documents and emails are circulating, revealing sensitive data about the USDT stablecoin, however Tether have declared that these documents are forged.

We’ve also seen the Tether marketcap grow from 4 Billion to 34 Billion in the past few months causing concerns amongst the crypto community in regards to the 1-to-1 backing against the US Dollar.

New York Court Case with Bitfinex

This ransom demand to Tether follows the news that they agreed to pay an agreed $18.5M settlements for a recent New York court case.

In a statement, New York Attorney General Letitia James said, “Bitfinex and Tether recklessly and unlawfully covered up massive financial losses to keep their scheme going and protect their bottom lines. Tether’s claims that its virtual currency was fully backed by U.S. dollars at all times was a lie.”

And the settlement statement said: “As of Nov. 2, 2018, tethers were again no longer backed 1-to-1 by U.S. dollars in a Tether bank account, because a substantial portion of the backing in the Deltec account had been transferred to Bitfinex to make up for the funds taken by Crypto Capital, while the corresponding funds transferred from Bitfinex’s Crypto Capital account to Tether’s Crypto Capital account were impaired by Crypto Capital’s actions.”

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Crypto News Tether

Tether Mint Another 1 Billion Dollars in USDT

The latest injection sees its market cap grow by another 1 Billion USD.

The marketcap of Tether has been increasing dramatically this year going from $4 Billion USD in Janruary to $34 Billion USD currently – all in the space of just two months.

Tether (USDT) Marketcap – Source

This news also follows some related news we covered, where a Bitcoin Whale Moves AU$1 Billion of BTC into Storage.

Following the Mint

Some suspicions are that the newly minted USDT is going tom FTX – an offshore crypto derivatives exchange.

Concerns

Some users are voicing their opinions on Twitter. Some suggestions that the new USDT will be used to buy the recent dip – although to our knowledge there has been no proof of this, yet.

Other users are concerned that if the stock market gets tokenised, then the minted cryptos could be used to buy stocks.

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Crypto News Ethereum Tether TRON

Tether swaps 2 Billion TRC-20 USDT to Ethereum

For the first time in 2021, the company behind the largest US-dollar backed stablecoin, Tether Inc., has swapped a significant amount of USDT supply from Tron blockchain (as TRC-20 token) to Ethereum (as ERC-20 token). This move from Tether is no longer a new thing in the cryptocurrency space, as they did a similar swap last year. The development usually happens when there's a huge demand for the stablecoin on Ethereum. Tether moves Tron USDT to Ethereum Following the announcement on Twitter by Paolo Ardoino, the chief technology officer at Tether Inc., two billion USDT (~US$2 billion) was converted from the Tron blockchain to Ethereum. The swap was completed in five different transactions as Ardoino noted, which was also confirmed by Whale Alert, a dedicated crypto transaction tracker. Noteworthily, the process of swapping to Ethereum ensures that the total circulating supply of USDT doesn't increase or reduce. https://twitter.com/paoloardoino/status/1356871947674656768?s=19 However, Ethereum USDT supply will increase in this case by exactly two billion USDT, while Tron's supply will decrease by two billion USDT. The development today is coming about five days after Justin Sun, the CEO of Tron, celebrated a total supply of 10 billion USDT issued by Tether on their blockchain network. https://twitter.com/justinsuntron/status/1355123845783408645?s=19 Ethereum Remains the top Network for USDT According to Tronscan, the network explorer for Tron blockchain, there are currently 8.6 billion USDT issued on Tron, all of which are currently in circulation, and held in about 1,815,892 addresses. Also, a further glance at Etherscan confirmed a total supply of 17.9 billion USDTs on Ethereum. These USDTs on Ethereum are held in over 2.4 million addresses. Over the years, Ethereum has since remained the biggest network for USDT, followed by Tron and other blockchain networks.

For the first time in 2021, the company behind the largest US-dollar backed stablecoin, Tether Inc., has swapped a significant amount of USDT supply from Tron blockchain (as TRC-20 token) to Ethereum (as ERC-20 token). This move from Tether is no longer a new thing in the cryptocurrency space, as they did a similar swap last year. The development usually happens when there’s a huge demand for the stablecoin on Ethereum.

Tether moves Tron USDT to Ethereum

Following the announcement on Twitter by Paolo Ardoino, the chief technology officer at Tether Inc., two billion USDT (~US$2 billion) was converted from the Tron blockchain to Ethereum. The swap was completed in five different transactions as Ardoino noted, which was also confirmed by Whale Alert, a dedicated crypto transaction tracker. Noteworthily, the process of swapping to Ethereum ensures that the total circulating supply of USDT doesn’t increase or reduce.

However, Ethereum USDT supply will increase in this case by exactly two billion USDT, while Tron’s supply will decrease by two billion USDT. The development today is coming about five days after Justin Sun, the CEO of Tron, celebrated a total supply of 10 billion USDT issued by Tether on their blockchain network.

Ethereum Remains the top Network for USDT

According to Tronscan, the network explorer for Tron blockchain, there are currently 8.6 billion USDT issued on Tron, all of which are currently in circulation, and held in about 1,815,892 addresses. Also, a further glance at Etherscan confirmed a total supply of 17.9 billion USDTs on Ethereum. These USDTs on Ethereum are held in over 2.4 million addresses.

Over the years, Ethereum has since remained the biggest network for USDT, followed by Tron and other blockchain networks.