Circle’s USD Coin (USDC) stablecoin has crossed the $16 trillion mark in total cumulative volume.

While this number falls short of traditional financial powerhouses like Visa, which processed over $12 trillion in payments just last year, it highlights the remarkable growth of stablecoins. Despite their relatively short existence, stablecoins have quickly established themselves as key players in the global financial market.

Stablecoins play an essential role in the crypto ecosystem. They facilitate the smooth transfer of funds, support seamless trading between tokens, and enable payments, especially for cross-border transactions.

Launched in 2018, USDC is the second-largest stablecoin by market capitalization, with $34.6 billion currently in circulation. Circle has strategically positioned USDC as a more regulatory-compliant stablecoin, differentiating it from competitors like USDT.

This approach has contributed to USDC’s dominance in transactions this year, surpassing Tether’s USDT despite having a smaller circulating supply. According to Artemis, USDC now accounts for roughly 50% of the total stablecoin transaction volume.

Solana fuelling USDC’s growth

USDC’s transaction volume is primarily driven by the Solana blockchain, which holds more than three-quarters of the stablecoin market share. Data from DeFiLlama indicates that USDC makes up about 65% of Solana’s $3.98 billion stablecoin supply.

A stablecoin dashboard created by Visa Inc., in collaboration with Allium Labs, shows that USDC’s transaction volume on Solana has soared to approximately $8.29 trillion since the beginning of last year. Its nearest rival, USDT on TRON, saw a volume of $7 trillion during the same timeframe.

This growth isn’t surprising, given Solana’s popularity for its speed and lower transaction costs, which have attracted interest from traditional financial players like PayPal.

The recent surge in memecoin trading and DeFi activities on Solana has further propelled its rise. Over the past few months, the market has even seen instances when trading activity on Solana surpassed Ethereum’s.

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Japan’s DMM Group, along with its subsidiary DMM Crypto, is partnering with blockchain developer Progmat to explore the launch of a stablecoin under existing local regulations, according to an Aug. 23 statement.

Initially, the stablecoin will be integrated into DMM’s digital economy project, Seamoon Protocol. It will be designed to enhance stability and ultimately boost the value of the network’s planned native SMP token.

According to the statement:

“The stablecoin is intended to serve as a reserve currency underpinning the project’s treasury pool and a price stabilization mechanism for SMP–a soon-to-be-launched cryptocurrency intended to be the primary means of payment within Seamoon Protocol and DMM’s larger portfolio of companies.”

DMM Crypto CEO Nagato Kasaki said the planned stablecoin will help the firm to create an avenue for the global community to experience DMM’s cultural universe and co-create new experiences together through the Seamoon Protocol.

Three phase launch

According to the firm, the stablecoin’s mainnet launch will occur in three phases. The first phase of the launch will focus on stabilizing the Seamoon Protocol and its SMP token price by establishing a treasury pool using proprietary stablecoins.

Subsequently, the stablecoin will be introduced within the DMM ecosystem, serving as a payment method for transactions between DMM companies and business partners. This could include loan repayments and other uses, expanding the token’s utility beyond the Seamoon Protocol.

In the final phase, the stablecoin will be made available to registered partners and verified users. Over time, it is expected to become an alternative to credit card payments for these verified users.

Stablecoin growing market

DMM’s initiative comes amid the rapid growth of the stablecoin ecosystem, which has attracted new entrants.

According to CryptoSlate data, stablecoin’s total market capitalization has surged from just over $100 billion to a new all-time high of around $170 billion within the past seven months amid improved market conditions.

During this period, the market has witnessed the entrance of major crypto firms like Ripple, which have thrown their hats into the sector, while established players such as Tether’s USDT and Circle’s USDC have scored continued adoption and growth.

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Tether said it is expanding its USDT stablecoin to the layer-1 blockchain network Aptos, according to an Aug. 19 statement.

This move furthers USDT presence across various blockchain networks, including Ethereum, Tron, Avalanche, Celo, and Solana. However, most of Tether’s $116 billion supply remains concentrated on TRON and Ethereum, accounting for 88% of the total supply, according to DeFillama data.

Why Aptos?

Tether explained that integrating USDT on the Aptos blockchain will offer extremely low gas fees, costing a fraction of a penny. This will make transactions more cost-effective, benefiting microtransactions and large-scale enterprise operations.

The stablecoin issuer also cited Aptos’ strong developer community and thriving ecosystem as critical factors in its decision.

Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino praised Aptos’ innovative technology, stating that it provides a solid platform for faster and more cost-effective USDT transactions. He emphasized that this collaboration aligns with Tether’s commitment to innovation while offering users stable, reliable financial tools.

Aptos, co-founded by Mo Shaikh and Avery Ching, aims to offer a scalable and user-friendly infrastructure for decentralized apps and smart contracts. Both founders were previously involved in Meta’s Diem blockchain project.

Recently, Aptos experienced a surge in activity due to the launch of the click-to-earn game Tapos 2. On Aug. 15, the network processed over 326 million transactions, reaching a peak of over 12,000 transactions per second.

DeFi opportunity

Market observers suggest this move will inject new energy into Aptos’s DeFi sector.

VibrantX Finance, a yield aggregator platform, noted that the integration could boost liquidity in the Aptos ecosystem. This would facilitate smoother transactions, attract new users and developers, and increase capital inflow.

It added:

“With USDT, a widely recognized and trusted stablecoin, more users can easily participate in DeFi activities on Aptos including vibrantx.finance. As a leading stablecoin, USDT can also bridge the gap between Aptos and other blockchains, expanding DeFi possibilities.”

According to DeFillama data, Aptos is the fourteenth largest DeFi network, with $730 million in total value of assets locked.

The news is notable, considering Tether recently removed native support for EOS and Alogrand earlier this year amid a shift in  focus towards “enhancing community-driven blockchain support.”

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Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino predicted that brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) could become mainstream consumer products within the next 20 years.

Ardoino’s remarks followed a breakthrough by Blackrock Neurotech, a portfolio company of Tether. The firm successfully restored speech in a patient who had nearly lost the ability to communicate via its brain implant

BCI

On Aug. 14, the New England Journal of Medicine published a report detailing how Blackrock Neurotech’s innovative text-to-speech brain implant enabled an Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) patient to speak again.

Ardoino noted that this breakthrough might be just the beginning, with BCIs potentially offering solutions for millions worldwide suffering from paralysis, lost functions, and neurological disorders that hinder basic abilities like walking, seeing, hearing, or talking.

Ardoino likened BCIs to having direct, low-latency access to computing power and AI capabilities, bypassing the usual information loss that occurs when converting thoughts into speech. He envisions a future where BCIs could lead to a new class of humans, “Human Sapiens^3,” whose brains would have access to advanced computational power, infinite knowledge, and AI.

BCIs are advanced devices that allow users to control applications or devices using only their thoughts. Ardoino’s keen interest in this field is aligned with Tether’s majority stake in Blackrock Neurotech, a company directly competing with Elon Musk‘s Neuralink to bring these technologies to the public.

However, Ardoino concluded that the technology must be open and safe for public use. He stated:

“We need to ensure that this technology will be as open, safe, and privacy-respecting as possible. Almost like a brain-operative system.”

Meanwhile, this development is part of Tether’s broader EVO strategy, which focuses on pioneering projects that redefine and empower humans in the future.

Decentralized AI

Notably, the company is also making giant strides in its AI development, with Ardoino recently revealing that the firm is looking to challenge the dominance of technology giants like Microsoft and Amazon.

According to him, AI technology is becoming heavily politicized, and an independent player like Tether will be crucial to the industry’s growth.

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Tether’s (USDT) stablecoin has reached a historic milestone of exceeding $115 billion in supply, according to an Aug. 8 post by CEO Paolo Ardoino on social media platform X.

CryptoSlate data shows that USDT’s market capitalization grew by more than $1 billion in the past week. This surge coincided with Bitcoin’s price rebound to $62,000 after dipping to $49,000.

Blockchain analyst Lookonchain reported that $1.3 billion worth of USDT was moved to several centralized exchanges, including Kraken, OKX, Coinbase, and Bullish, amid the broader crypto market uptrend since Aug. 5.

This achievement has increased USDT’s dominance in the stablecoin market to approximately 70%. Data from Tether’s transparency page showed that over 50% of Tether’s supply is on Tron, while around 41% is on Ethereum.

Compliance and expansion

Meanwhile, Ardoino told Bloomberg on Aug. 8 that the company plans to expand its workforce to 200 by mid-2025, with a strong emphasis on enhancing its compliance team.

Ardoino highlighted the company’s commitment to mitigating illicit activities related to its stablecoin on secondary markets.

Over the past year, Tether has faced increased scrutiny over the potential misuse of USDT by sanctioned entities and malicious actors. The company, however, has continued to publicly maintain that it is strengthening its compliance efforts by cooperating with authorities.

Despite having a smaller workforce than other tech and crypto giants, Tether reported record profits of $5.2 billion in the first half of 2024.

Crypto education initiatives

In a parallel development, Tether is also advancing blockchain education through a partnership with the Africa Blockchain Institute.

This collaboration aims to educate students across five Ivory Coast universities —including Université Alassane Ouattara, Université d’Abobo-Adjamé, Université Félix Houphouët-Boigny, and Institut National Polytechnique Félix Houphouët-Boigny— about blockchain technology, cryptocurrencies, smart contracts, DeFi, and industry applications.

Ardoino stressed the importance of this initiative, noting the growing interest in crypto across Africa and its increasing relevance in daily life. He added:

“Tether is committed to providing the next generation of Ivory Coast and African leaders with the skills and understanding needed to excel in the digital economy. We believe It is essential that people have the required knowledge to make informed decisions.”

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Swan Bitcoin, a Bitcoin-focused financial services firm, said it is ending its managed mining business alongside its Initial Public Offering (IPO) plans.

On July 22, the firm’s CEO Cory Klippsten said:

“Swan is unlikely to continue with our Managed Mining business in the near term. Without the expectation of significant near-term revenue from our Managed Mining unit, we are pulling our plans to IPO in the near future.”

Klippsten also stated that the firm was “pulling back from our accelerated spending plan for our core financial services business. Unfortunately, this includes staff cuts across many functions.”

Why is Swan downsizing?

Swan’s decision is surprising, considering the firm recently launched a bespoke Managed Bitcoin Mining services in May that attracted interest from major institutional firms like stablecoin issuer Tether. 

At the time, the company stated that it had spent over $330 million to increase its mining capacity to 7.5 EH. It also had an ambitious plan of increasing its capacity to 19.5 EH this year and about 100 EH by 2026.

However, market observers noted that Bitcoin mining companies have considerably struggled following April’s halving event that cut mining rewards by 50%. Due to this, several miners, including Marathon Digital, have sought different revenue diversification strategies, such as pivoting towards artificial intelligence and mining other proof-of-work blockchains.

Nevertheless, the market is still experiencing bullish sentiments, with Bitcoin price enjoying a rebound buoyed by the strong inflows into the spot BTC exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and hopes of a Donald Trump presidency providing greater regulatory clarity for the emerging industry.

Klippsten acknowledged that the market conditions are currently favorable, pointing out that:

“This is an incredible moment in time for Bitcoin, with real institutional adoption, an increasingly favorable regulatory and political environment, and the ranks of Bitcoiners swelling in number.”

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Editor Editor

Liam ‘Akiba’ Wright

Senior Editor at CryptoSlate

Also known as “Akiba,” Liam is a reporter, editor and podcast producer at CryptoSlate. He believes that decentralized technology has the potential to make widespread positive change.

Stablecoin issuer Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino has urged increased investment in decentralized peer-to-peer technologies after a global IT outage today, July 19.

CryptoSlate reported that a significant technical issue with CrowdStrike’s centralized software led to a global outage affecting many sectors. This issue caused Windows computers to display the Blue Screen of Death (BSOD), disrupting services and businesses worldwide.

CrowdStrike’s CEO, George Kurtz, acknowledged the impact of this incident and explained that the problem “has been identified, isolated, and a fix has been deployed.” He added:

“This is not a security incident or cyberattack. The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed. We refer customers to the support portal for the latest updates and will continue to provide complete and continuous updates on our website. We further recommend organizations ensure they’re communicating with CrowdStrike representatives through official channels.”

‘Peer-to-peer tech’

However, Ardoino suggested that this incident could have been avoided with more investment in peer-to-peer technologies.

He noted that the internet today is heavily centralized around the services of three companies, and any issues within these companies’ infrastructure can significantly impact entire nations, cities, communities, and businesses.

He stated:

“Concentration and centralization are creating a very fragile world, where almost all the technology we have developed until today, can work only in the best case scenario, and will fail at the first sign of change in the social/environmental ecosystem.”

So, Ardoino highlighted that Tether and Holepunch, a platform designed to create apps without centralized data storage, are building technologies resilient enough to survive an apocalypse. Tether is a major investor in this technology.

Ardoino’s view mirrors the sentiment shared by many crypto stakeholders who pointed out that the global outage showed the importance of decentralization.

Gabor Gurbacs, the founder of PointsVille, said:

“The world’s infrastructure is migrating to robust, decentralized and non-custodial rails. Apocalypse-proofing financial and industrial products and infrastructure is increasingly not a choice, but a necessity.”

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Tether’s USDT supply is growing at its fastest rate on the Telegram-linked The Open Network (TON) blockchain.

According to Tether’s transparency page, the stablecoin issuer has issued $580 million worth of USDT tokens on the blockchain, and its net circulation sits at $519 million as of press time. This milestone comes less than two months after Tether issued its USDT stablecoin on the network.

Why Tether USDT is growing on TON

TON stated that the growth was due to the ease of performing transactions on its network. It stated:

“Sending digital dollars to anyone, anywhere, as easily as sending a text message is a reality for people all over the world. What’s more real than that?”

Market analysts also pointed out that USDT’s supply increase on TON could be linked to the significant investors’ interest in the blockchain ecosystem. Over the past month, TON has experienced considerable growth, with the network flipping the number of daily active addresses on the more storied Ethereum blockchain.

Additionally, Binance, the largest crypto exchange by trading volume, recently enabled support for TON’s USDT on its platform. This move has drastically expanded the crypto community’s access to the stablecoin on the blockchain network.

Tether scrutiny

While USDT’s growth coincides with the overall expansion of the TON ecosystem, a Consumer Research group in the US is now scrutinizing Tether.

On June 25, Fox Business journalist Eleanor Terret reported that Consumers Research, a US consumer advocacy group, recently intensified its efforts against the stablecoin issuer by distributing flyers about it to several lawmakers’ offices in Washington, DC.

The flyers accuse Tether of being involved in fraud investigations, terrorist financing, and having close ties with China. Part of the flyer reads:

“Tether’s shady business practices put consumers’ money at risk, while allowing bad actors to fund their illicit activities across the globe.”

As of press time, Tether has yet to respond to CryptoSlate’s request for comment. However, Tether CEO recently told CryptoSlate that the FUD against it is seemingly neverending and that he realizes the company may have been naive in believing it “could just keep our head down, work, and if we were proving that we were doing good to the world and that we were useful, all the FUD would go away eventually, right?”

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Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino revealed that the company would launch a new class of digital asset products on June 17.

He wrote on social media platform X:

“After a year of hard work, Tether will unveil its new class of digital assets products on Monday 17th June.”

While specific details about these products are still under wraps, the move reflects Tether’s expanding influence and ambitions in the financial sector. In May, Ardoino hinted at the company’s plans to emulate USDT’s success by eliminating monopolistic intermediaries in financial markets.

At the time, he disclosed plans for a peer-to-peer financial markets terminal utilizing Holepunch technology. He said:

“Tether might put significant resources to build a P2P financial markets terminal, based on Holepunch tech. As humanity is enjoying getting rid of monopolistic intermediaries for payments, we could also enjoy the same result in financial markets data infrastructure.”

Tether has yet to respond to CryptoSlate’s request for comment as of press time.

Tether’s diversification

Over the past year, Tether has intensified its diversification efforts beyond its USDT stablecoin product. The company has restructured its operations into four distinct sectors, including finance, data, education, and power.

These restructuring efforts aim to enhance its USDT distribution network and invest in ventures such as AI and Bitcoin mining.

Ardoino emphasized the company’s commitment to this strategy, announcing plans to invest over $1 billion in various deals within the next year. He reportedly said:

“It’s all about investing in technology that helps with disintermediation with traditional finance. Less reliance on the big tech companies like Google, Amazon and Microsoft.”

Meanwhile, these diversification efforts coincide with Tether’s improved finances. In its first-quarter report, the company generated substantial profits of more than $4 billion, with its USDT stablecoin accounting for around 70% of the market.

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Stablecoin issuer Tether has entered into an agreement to acquire up to $150 million worth of shares from prominent Bitcoin mining firm Bitdeer via a private placement deal, according to a May 31 statement.

Under the agreement, Tether has acquired 18,587,360 Class A ordinary shares from the BTC miner for $100 million. It could purchase up to 5,000,000 additional shares at $10.00 per share, translating to an extra $50 million. Cantor Fitzgerald & Co. acted as the private placement agent.

Following the news, Bitdeer shares jumped over 8% at pre-market trading to $6.35 as of press time, according to Google Finance data.

Bitdeer to fund expansion

The Singapore-based company intends to use the net proceeds from this investment to fund its data center expansion, ASIC-based mining rig development, working capital, and other general corporate purposes.

Bitdeer’s chief business officer, Linghui Kong, said:

“With Tether’s support, we are poised to accelerate our growth and continue our leadership in sustainable and efficient bitcoin mining. This partnership marks a significant milestone for Bitdeer, and we look forward to achieving great things together.”

Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether, added:

“Bitdeer’s proven track record and world-class management team are perfectly aligned with Tether’s long-term strategic vision. We anticipate close collaboration with Bitdeer across several key infrastructure areas moving forward.”

Tether’s growing businesses

This latest venture marks Tether’s ongoing push into the crypto mining sector, following a significant capital investment in Swan’s Managed Bitcoin Mining service.

In Apil, Tether revealed it was splitting into four divisions—Tether Data, Tether Finance, Tether Power, and Tether Edu—to reflect its broader interest in developing the emerging industry. The company revealed that this move aimed to broaden its influence and diversify beyond its core stablecoin operations.

Meanwhile, these diversification efforts coincide with Tether’s record financial performance. During the first quarter, the company posted substantial profits, with its USDT market capitalization rising to a new high of $111 billion, accounting for 77% of the top 10 stablecoins trading volumes on centralized exchanges, according to CCData.

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Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether, has responded to Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse‘s claims that the US government was targeting the company, the issuer of the largest stablecoin USDt.

During the weekend, reports emerged that Garlinghouse had suggested that a US government’s scrutiny of Tether could significantly affect the crypto industry. Garlinghouse said:

“The US Government is going after Tether. That is clear to me. I view Tether as a very important part of the ecosystem and I don’t know how to predict the impact it would have on the rest of the ecosystem.”

Tether’s response

In an extensive May 13 social media post, Ardoino dispelled concerns about potential regulatory action against Tether and accused Garlinghouse of sowing “fear about USDT.” He said:

“An uniformed CEO, leading a company being investigated by the SEC, launching a competitive stablecoin (cui prodest), is being reported spreading fear about USDt.”

Ardoino asserted that Tether’s ecosystem remains robust and secure, emphasizing its price stability, ample liquid reserves, top-tier custodianship, and rigorous compliance measures. He added:

“USDt is the most used stablecoin in the world, with hundreds of millions of users across primarily emerging markets and developing countries. Entire communities across these regions are unbanked, left behind by the traditional banking system because they are too poor to be of interest, and are using USDt daily as their checking and saving account.”

Furthermore, the Tether CEO enumerated various factors contributing to USDt’s compliance and adoption worldwide.

Ardoino disclosed that Tether has voluntarily honored 198 requests from law enforcement agencies to freeze wallets in the past year, 90 of which originated from the US. Over the last three years, Tether has complied with 339 such requests, with 158 coming from US law enforcement.

Moreover, he pointed out that the firm has collaborated with 124 law enforcement agencies across more than 40 countries and has frozen over $1.3 billion in assets associated with fraudulent activities, hacks, and money laundering.

Notably, a significant portion—over $639 million—was blocked in collaboration with US law enforcement agencies.

Ardoino concluded his statement by saying:

“Tether cooperates directly with law enforcement agencies, while other stablecoins, although they claim to be “more compliant” they require a judge order, allowing hackers, scammers and criminals a long time to move funds around.”

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