The burgeoning DeFi sector saw Tether mass-minted in 2020 – including $ 3 billion last month alone – bringing its market cap to over $ 15 billion.
There was just over $ 4 billion in circulation at the start of the year, and it is over $ 15 billion today. DeFi has been the driving force behind the Tether mining machine as more and more pools of liquidity are based on stable coins. Tether’s average daily transfer value was reported to have exceeded PayPal’s at the end of last month as demand for the stable coin continues to rise.
Tether announced the milestone, pointing out that its market cap has grown another billion over the past month:
Tether just passed a market cap of $ 15 billion!
In just one month, Tether’s market cap has increased by more than $ 3 billion, maintaining first place as the most liquid, stable, and trustworthy currency! pic.twitter.com/MLOWkiIDvF
– Tether (@Tether_to) September 17, 2020
An infographic from Flipsidecrypto.com shows Tether’s movements between users and exchanges this month. The major centralized exchanges still make up the lion’s share of USDT trading, with Binance and Bitfinex holding around $ 2 billion between them.
Image – flipsidecrypto.com
According to the Tether Transparency Report, the amount of UDST on Ethereum has now increased to over $ 10 billion, nearly two-thirds of the total supply. There is currently around $ 4.2 billion in circulation on Tron and $ 1.3 billion on Omni.
Late last month, Tether conducted a billion dollar token swap from Bitfinex to Binance, as reported by Cointelegraph. The swap was initiated because Binance had a surplus of 1 billion USDT based on the TRON blockchain and wanted to exchange it for the corresponding amount from Ethereum-based tether.
On September 15, Tether initiated another swap as the demand for the ERC-20 version of the stablecoin exceeds that of other networks like Tron.
Tomorrow, Tether will coordinate with a third party to perform two chain changes (switch from Tron to ERC20 protocol) for USD 1 billion.
The overall supply of the tether does not change during this process.
Read more here: https://t.co/abfgnELSvi
– Tether (@Tether_to) September 14, 2020
However, there are ongoing steps to move tethered transmissions from Ethereum to other networks as gas charges continue to cripple the network. Last month, USDT was made available on the Layer 2 OMG Network and launched on the high-speed Solana blockchain.
In the meantime, some members of the crypto community are still calling for a full audit to see if there are $ 15 billion in real dollars and assets backing the stablecoin, or if the whole thing is a house of cards.
The truth may be revealed in the ongoing New York tether lawsuit. The Attorney General’s Office (OAG) filed a letter on September 8, requesting disclosure of financial documents. The lawsuit concerns allegations that Bitfinex “lost” approximately $ 1 billion in customer funds and used Tether reserves to cover up the imbalance. Tether and Bitfinex have dismissed the lawsuit as unfounded.
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