Tether Discloses Its Reserves By Q1 2023, Holds More Gold Than Bitcoin
The world’s largest stablecoin issuer Tether disclosed the first quarter results for this year of 2023, announcing a net profit of a staggering $1.48 billion. The company’s bottom line has doubled from $700 million it generated during the same period last year.
Asper the consolidated reserves report shared by Tether and signed by accounting firm BDO Italia, the total assets by the end of the March quarter stood at a staggering $81.8 billion, with a majority of it lying in the US Treasury Bills.
Furthermore, the stablecoin issuer said that it holds $1.5 billion in Bitcoin and $3.4 billion in gold on its balance sheet which is 2% and 4% of its total reserves, respectively. This is for the first time that Tether has been transparent about its Bitcoin and Gold holdings.
Commenting on this development, Paolo Ardoino, the CTO of Tether stated: "We are thrilled with the tremendous success Tether has achieved in Q1 2023, with our reserves’ surplus reaching an all time high of $2.44B. Our net profits for the quarter were $1.48B, a testament to the strength and stability of our platform. We continue to monitor the risk-adjusted return on all assets within our portfolio on an ongoing basis and expect to make further changes as the overall economic environment changes and the market cycle progresses as a part of our normal, ongoing risk management processes”.
As said, Tether’s USD-pegged stablecoin USDT is currently the largest stablecoin oil the market with a market cap of over $82 billion. It is twice the size of its immediate competitor i.e. Circle’s USDC which is currently at $30 billion. Apart from USDT, Tether also issues cryptocurrencies pegged to other currencies and the Gold, however, they are quite small in terms of market share.
Tether’s USDT stablecoin has been widening its gap with Circle’s USDC. On one hand, Tether continues to increase its USDT circulation. But on the other hand, Circle’s USDC has been constantly losing market share. Over the last year, the USDC’s market share dropped by 46%. Also, the news of USDC’s depegging with the US dollar earlier this year created a panic like situation leading to massive withdrawals from USDC. As a result, a lot of USDC’s customers moved their money into USDT benefitting Tether.
“Looking ahead to Q2, we have an extremely positive outlook and remain committed to transparency, which is why we have introduced new categories in the reserves’ breakdown in our quarterly report to provide even greater transparency to our users,” Ardoino added.