What Is Tether (USDT)? USDT is a stablecoin (stable-value cryptocurrency) that mirrors the price of the U.S.
dollar, issued by a Hong Kong-based company Tether.
The token’s peg to the USD is achieved via maintaining a sum of commercial paper, fiduciary deposits, cash, reserve repo notes, and treasury bills in reserves that is equal in USD value to the number of USDT in circulation.
Originally launched in July 2014 as Realcoin, a second-layer cryptocurrency token built on top of Bitcoin’s blockchain through the use of the Omni platform, it was later renamed to USTether, and then, finally, to USDT.
In addition to Bitcoin’s, USDT was later updated to work on the Ethereum, EOS, Tron, Algorand, and OMG blockchains.
The stated purpose of USDT is to combine the unrestricted nature of cryptocurrencies — which can be sent between users without a trusted third-party intermediary — with the stable value of the US dollar.
Stablecoins are increasingly used as an inflation hedge in recent times; compared to keeping fiat currency in a savings account averaging 0.06%, users can lend their stablecoins and earn yields ranging from 3% to as high as 20%.
However, keep in mind that regulatory, platform risks and more entail.
USDT’s unique feature is the fact that its value is guaranteed by Tether to remain pegged to the U.S.
dollar.
According to Tether, whenever it issues new USDT tokens, it allocates the same amount of USD to its reserves, thus ensuring that USDT is fully backed by cash and cash equivalents.
The famously high volatility of the crypto markets means that cryptocurrencies can rise or fall by 10-20% within a single day, making them unreliable as a store of value.
USDT, on the other hand, is protected from these fluctuations.
This property makes USDT a safe haven for crypto investors: during periods of high volatility, they can park their portfolios in Tether without having to completely cash out into USD.
In addition, USDT provides a simple way to transact a U.S.
dollar equivalent between regions, countries and even continents via blockchain — without having to rely on a slow and expensive intermediary, like a bank or a financial services provider.
However, over the years, there have been a number of controversies regarding the validity of Tether’s claims about their USD reserves, at times disrupting USDT’s price, which went down as low as $0.88 at one point in its history.
Many have raised concerns about the fact that Tether’s reserves have never been fully audited by an independent third party.
What Is the Tether FUD About? Tether has been the target of a lot of FUD due to its murky balance sheet and lack of a public audit.
The company has repeatedly been fined for misleading statements around the state of its books.
After Tether released a first breakdown of its balances, it came under even more scrutiny from regulators over its claims that all issued stablecoins are fully backed by dollar reserves.
