If Tether only has ~75% of the USD they claim, wouldn't the logical outcome be that anyone holding USDT immediately sells it for other crypto assets until the USDT price hits $0.75? Someone walk me through the logic of how this is bad for BTC.

most btc transactions are done through usdt, you're not eliminating "competition" you're eliminating a system whose entire purpose is to facilitate trading

So buy pressure goes down because it'll be harder for people to get money into the system to buy BTC? Makes sense, although it seems like USDC could just step in to fill the void (it's 54% as big as USDT already).

Yup. Tether, the biggest Ponzi scheme in the history of the world, bigger than Bernie Madoff?

Buy pressure goes down because a large portion of the money going into the system was faked/nonexistent.

I read things like this and I wonder if the maxis will ever get it. Judging by Peter Schiff, I’ll go with no.

Dollars are backed by the fact the US is bordered by two oceans and two allies, has Apple Microsoft Google Berkshire et al, the govt can literally print money to prevent default, you need dollars to acquire oil in the international market, has the largest and most liquid capital markets, has the best universities, has fertile farmland, has vast natural resources, and I’ll just stop there. The big risk is the decay of our political institutions.

Myanmar’s exiled govt adopts Tether as its official currency according to Bloomberg. Is Tether fiat now? Would definitely hold title of most ironic currency ever.

If Tether collapses it will be because much of that capital didn't actually exist.

Frankly, I disagree completely. If china can ban 60% of the hashrate and btc shakes it off, tether collapsing would be just another blow that makes it stronger.

Capital isnt there boys, el salvador raising a 1B bond, future ETF most succesful ETF.

But capital isnt there..?
Be objective man, who cares tether, the day it collapse it will hurt shtcoin 10times more than btc.

"Bitconnect!"

Why would tether ever collapse if all of the money is there?


The only thing I can see that would make tether collapse is if the money isn't all there and they've been printing tether out of thin air. If that's the case, then much of the capital you think is going to fly into btc for safety isn't going to fly anywhere because it doesn't exist.

I don't really have an opinion on tether except to say some of the numbers seem fantastical and the timing of the printing usually seems incredibly convenient. I don't think we can just hand wave it away and say if it collapses it won't effect btc.

New boss same as the old boss

yeah there's been so many sensational posts that are so far out there you'd have to be interested in the entertainment aspect to unpack them

When bitcoin dips sharply the exchanges freeze. A billion of tether is printed here and there during sell-offs. If say 5% of the market is funny money, removing it doesn't equal a 5% move in price. If those numbers are true, you think tether is fabricating money out of thin air, and that will stop, you have to realize you're taking on massive risk here.

Also it should be noted how correlated bitcoin has been to the stock market for the last while. This is while inflation and inflation announcements have shown rare circumstance. Clearly the price of bitcoin has been more correlated to speculation and risk taking than any sort of store of value, hedge, inflation safe haven etc.

Although bitcoin has been very kind to its hodlers, they also have to be aware of the risk here. 100k meme's might be flooding your internet but very few things in life are guaranteed. 100k in Dec is very different from 2030 or never. Be careful

Do you have a source for this claim? I'm genuinely curious. I've been buying, selling, and transferring BTC and nearly 20 altcoins for the past 4 years, and I've never had a reason to use USDT (or any other stablecoin, for that matter). I've used 6 different exchanges, and I've never had a problem linking them to my traditional bank accounts.

it's commonly said and if you think about it, it makes sense as why would anyone ever go through the hassle of transferring usd into usdt if that's how it would remain

page 8-9

https://www.cryptocompare.com/media/...ew_2021_02.pdf

it holds steady above 50% of all btc transactios and sometimes goes as high as 80%ish of volume

The issue is if they're spinning Tether out of air (they are), and then others are being loaned 500m to a billion in Tether (which is happening), eventually when you unravel this thing there's no real dollars, anywhere. You're talking about flight, but what happens when it's all funny money?

The biggest risk I see is what happens when Tether is hypothetically declared illegal/non-compliant overnight (in most major economies), and everyone wants to swap back to something (I get your point that some of that something is btc, but someone has to want your useless tether in that swap). If you consider what I said above, the rug is indeed potentially yuge.


But your point is well taken. If everyone tried to pull out their dollars at once, it's Mad Max in under a month. The only difference is nobody is trying to declare the USD potentially non-compliant (or worse). But that is what is potentially on the horizon for Tether.


With how much leverage and wash trading there is in this market, I think the range of outcomes of vanishing Tether (and or other stables) is at least worth having some consideration for. That scene in the Big Short where he says "Hey, there's a bubble". That's starting to look like what we're looking at here (short term).

Btw I read an incredible Twitter thread on the political polarization of crypto, and how the left cannot afford to make it into an election issue for the right. I would think that election outcomes will be some of the most important outcomes for price in the medium term.

Yup. Crypto ppl are an incredibly strong group now and it will be a big factor in the midterms.

https://www.coindesk.com/markets/202...-its-reserves/

This is a little different from Dumb and Dumber IOUs.





I'm not following why people continue to say Tether has never been audited. I thought a DA did a very thorough audit, followed by Tether being allowed on Coinbase, which likely did an even more thorough audit.

A report from a dodgy Cayman Islands accountant?

So the argument is that they have been audited, but it was not by a credible institution and therefore shouldn't be trusted?

Quote:

7/21/21
Tether promised audits as far back as 2017, but has yet to produce one.

Seems like if you're legit an audit would be a boon for business. Unless of course your business relies on shady ****.

"October 15, 2021

Washington, D.C. — The Commodity Futures Trading Commission today issued an order simultaneously filing and settling charges against Tether Holdings Limited, Tether Limited, Tether Operations Limited, and Tether International Limited (d/b/a Tether) for making untrue or misleading statements and omissions of material fact in connection with the U.S. dollar tether token (USDT) stablecoin. The order requires Tether to pay a civil monetary penalty of $41 million and to cease and desist from any further violations of the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA) and CFTC regulations, as charged."

https://www.cftc.gov/PressRoom/PressReleases/8450-21

Cool thanks a lot, I wasn't aware of that. I really thought the earlier audit had put a lot of this to bed, it's a shame to hear it's still likely to be a problem and that audit was not satisfactory.

There's another rabbit hole if you're interested. The person who founded Tether is a known scam artist with a dodgy history. Apparently, he's a former "child star" who scammed a bunch of people in the early days of crypto, then went on to start his own scam...Tether.

I don't have the details or a reference for you but if this is true it doesn't make me feel good about Tether.

I stopped trading on woo, even though the zero commission is amazing, all pairs are against usdt which is a bit shady. Better to pay a little and not end up with a big bag of usdt just in case....