Tether has secured commitments from 15 Bitcoin mining operators, ASIC manufacturers and mining pools to develop and maintain integrations with its Mining Development Kit (MDK), an open-source framework built to standardize how applications interact with mining infrastructure.
The 15 initial commitments include mining and infrastructure companies such as Bitdeer, BITMAIN, Canaan, MicroBT, Foundry Digital, Luxor Technology, F2Pool and OCEAN, Tether said Saturday.
The initiative aims to reduce fragmentation across the industry and create a common foundation for AI-driven automation, allowing developers to build applications and autonomous systems that work across different hardware and software environments without repeatedly engineering vendor-specific integrations.
Mining facilities can contain thousands of machines from multiple manufacturers, with equipment connected to different pools and managed through separate software. These systems often lack interoperability, forcing operators to manage them individually and developers to rebuild integrations whenever they work with a new vendor or platform.
Tether said the problem limits automation as operators explore using AI to monitor equipment, identify faults, optimize performance and eventually take autonomous action. MDK is designed to give these applications a consistent way to understand and control different systems.
Under the framework, each participating company will maintain an MDK Worker that translates its existing hardware, pool or system interface into a common format.
Companies can choose which functions to expose without replacing their technology or giving up control, according to Tether. Applications built on MDK can then operate across supported systems through the same interface, reducing dependence on individual vendors and allowing developers to extend their tools to more of the mining industry as additional Workers become available.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said software would increasingly operate physical infrastructure rather than simply report on it, requiring a common way for different machines to communicate.
Tether’s QVAC mining agent is already running directly on MDK as an early example of an AI application using the shared layer.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Estefano Gomez. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Tether’s reported $6.8M payment to Nxum Group, co-founded by ex-White House crypto advisor Bo Hines, has drawn congressional scrutiny.
According to Senator Richard Blumenthal, a ranking Democrat on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI), the allegations raise ethics and corruption concerns.
For further clarity, Blumenthal asked Tether to clarify the alleged payments and potential conflict of interest by 3rd November. He wrote,
Tether’s alleged multimillion dollar payment to a firm controlled by the White House official primarily responsible for cryptocurrency policy implicates federal ethics, anti-corruption, and lobbying laws.
Sen. Blumenthal wants Tether to submit all payments to Bo Hines, including the crypto wallet addresses used, between January and August 2025. The Senator also asked for documentation of all lobbying services Nxum offered Tether.
Tether’s growing regulatory scrutiny Bo Hines left the White House Crypto Council last August and was shortly hired by Tether as a strategic advisor. He now oversees Tether’s U.S operations.
While serving as President Trump’s Chief Crypto Advisor, Tether reportedly routed payments through a third-party marketing firm called Notorious. Hines’ Nxum allegedly began getting direct payments after he left White House last August. Blumenthal also sought clarity on the arrangement with Notorious.
In fact, some reports alleged that the payments by Tether were meant to seek more time to comply with U.S GENIUS Act provisions and keep its offshore operations.
For its part, Tether acknowledged knowing the allegations,which were first reported by the Wall Street Journal in mid-October. However, the stablecoin issuer denied the claims,
External counsel previously conducted an in-depth internal investigation into the matter, which found no evidence of wrongdoing.
Earlier in October, Blumenthal sought clarity on Tether’s relationship with Cantor Fitzgerald, the issuer’s reserve custodian. The Senator also pressed the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate Tether’s role in Iranian crypto illicit flows.
Despite growing Tether scrutiny, however, USDT adoption has continued to rise, especially overseas. Total USDT users crossed 700M for the first time in Q3, translating to 6% quarterly growth. Over $70B or 39% of USDT supply is now dominated by savers, underscoring that the stablecoin goes beyond just payments.
Source: Tether Final Summary Senator Blumenthal raised ethics and corruption concerns about Tether’s alleged $6.8M payments to ex-Trump crypto advisor Bo Hines. Tether denied the claims and any wrongdoing, citing an ‘in-depth internal investigation.’
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
Disclosure. PANews may publish sponsored content, partner content, advertisements, affiliate links, event promotions, and market commentary involving Web3 projects, service providers, or financial products. PANews personnel, contributors, or affiliates may hold digital assets or other interests related to covered topics. See our Terms of Service.
HSBC, one of the world’s largest banking institutions, has launched RedCoin, a Hong Kong dollar-backed stablecoin, making it available to more than 3.3 million users of its PayMe mobile payment app. The bank activated RedCoin on Friday, allowing users to send tokens to friends or pay at over 100,000 affiliated merchants in Hong Kong.
RedCoin Launch and FeaturesRedCoin (ticker: RCHKD) is designed as a stablecoin, maintaining a 1:1 peg with the Hong Kong dollar. The new digital currency enables users to make payments, transfer money among contacts, and shop at local outlets via the PayMe platform, without the need to interact with traditional crypto exchanges.
John O’Neill, HSBC’s managing director of digital assets and currencies, stated the bank aims to expand RedCoin’s reach in the near future. “We are excited by the market’s interest in HSBC RedCoin. This is only the beginning. We will soon add more products, including expanding into wholesale corporate and institutional use cases.”
“We are excited by the market’s interest in HSBC RedCoin,” noted John O’Neill. He confirmed that product expansion is already underway, with plans to move into wholesale, corporate, and institutional applications.
HSBC received its issuer license for RedCoin from the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) in April. The HKMA, which acts as the city’s de facto central bank, implemented a new stablecoin regulatory regime in August 2025 that saw more than 36 companies compete for licenses.
At launch, HSBC’s reserve tracker reported approximately $10.2 million in RedCoin circulation, fully backed by $10.4 million in cash reserves. While the volume is significantly smaller than the over $300 billion stablecoin market currently dominated by Tether’s USDT and Circle’s USDC, RedCoin marks a shift as it is issued by a major global bank directly to retail consumers for practical everyday use.
StablecoinBacking AssetsIssuerCirculation after LaunchBlockchain PlatformRedCoin (RCHKD)100% CashHSBC$10.2 millionHSBC Private LedgerUSDTReserves (cash and equivalents)Tether$100+ billionEthereum, Tron, othersUSDCReserves (cash and equivalents)Circle$30+ billionEthereum, othersRedCoin operates on HSBC’s private ledger, and its balances are confined within the PayMe ecosystem; transfers between PayMe and HSBC’s main banking app are not possible. Unlike standard bank deposits, RedCoin is not covered by the Hong Kong Deposit Protection Scheme, meaning users do not have deposit insurance on these digital holdings.
Later this year, HSBC plans to introduce RedCoin to its HK Mobile Banking app. This rollout will allow customers to access a tokenized share class of HSBC’s existing Hong Kong dollar money market fund via RedCoin.
Mini dictionary: Tokenization refers to converting rights to an asset, like shares or real estate, into digital tokens on a blockchain or ledger system. These tokens represent ownership and can be traded more efficiently, often with lower costs and enhanced transparency.
Audit Plans and Market ContextHSBC expects to publish the first independent attestation of RedCoin’s reserves—a third-party auditor’s verification confirming the cash backing—after the fourth quarter of 2026.
Historically, stablecoins have been dominated by crypto-native issuers like Tether and Circle, with the majority of tokens circulating on public blockchains and used mainly for trading or settlement operations. RedCoin’s direct integration into mainstream financial services reflects a growing trend of traditional banks entering the stablecoin market, offering consumers direct access through familiar platforms.
Upcoming Dollar Stablecoin From 21 Major BanksIn a related development, 21 major global banks, including Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, and Citi, announced plans to establish a jointly owned company to issue a U.S. dollar stablecoin. The yet-unnamed venture is scheduled for formation in the second half of 2026, with a launch target for the first half of 2027. The new stablecoin initiative, if completed, could significantly increase institutional involvement and competition within the stablecoin sector.
These moves highlight how leading banks, through innovations like RedCoin, are gradually integrating blockchain-based payment tokens into everyday consumer finance and positioning themselves to capitalize on the rapidly expanding world of digital assets.
Tether announced in a post that 15 industry participants, including mining farm operators, ASIC manufacturers, and mining pools, have committed to jointly build and maintain integrations with its Mining Development Kit (MDK). The MDK is an open-source framework designed to enhance interoperability across different mining infrastructures and support AI-driven automation. Each participating company will build and maintain MDK Worker adapters, converting the existing interfaces of their hardware, mining pools, or systems into a unified interface. Businesses do not need to replace existing technology or surrender control of their systems, and can choose which functions to offer via the open interface on their own. Once adapted, developers can build applications, monitoring systems, or AI agents for the MDK, eliminating the need to develop separate integrations for each device manufacturer and mining pool. Tether noted that this will lay the foundation for cross-vendor device monitoring, fault identification, performance optimization, and future autonomous operations, while reducing redundant development work and reliance on a single supplier.
Aave has just changed the borrowing conditions of USDT on its Ethereum V3 Core crypto market. Since October 21, rates increase faster as soon as 92% of liquidity is borrowed, compared to 94% previously. At a utilization level of 94%, the theoretical rate thus goes from 4.5% to 7%. The decentralized finance protocol aims to preserve more funds available for withdrawals.
In Brief
Aave lowers the optimal USDT utilization threshold from 94% to 92%.
At 94% utilization, the theoretical borrowing rate rises from 4.5% to 7%.
The change creates an additional theoretical buffer of 57.8 million USDT.
Aave Makes Crypto Borrowing in USDT More Expensive
The change took effect on October 21, at Ethereum block 26,241,799. Aave regularly adjusts the parameters of its markets to control risks. In July, the protocol had already considered removing several crypto reserves that had become unprofitable.
This time, the changes directly affect users who borrow USDT. The mechanism remains quite simple. On Aave, the borrowing rate depends on the proportion of deposits already used by borrowers. When liquidity starts to run low, interest rises to discourage new loans and encourage repayments.
The threshold from which this increase becomes particularly rapid falls from 94% to 92%. The other curve parameters remain unchanged. The base rate remains zero, the first slope at 4.5%, and the second at 10%.
At 94% utilization, the old configuration yielded an annual rate of 4.5%. With the new parameters, it reaches 7%. For a steady loan of one million USDT, this 2.5-point gap would represent an additional 25,000 USDT in interest over a full year if rates remained unchanged. Borrowings are not blocked beyond 92%, they simply become more expensive.
57.8 Million USDT of Potential Liquidity
LlamaRisk, responsible for monitoring several risks on Aave, recommended this change after examining the protocol’s crypto reserves. Its analysis covered about 2.89 billion USDT deposited versus 2.48 billion borrowed. The utilization rate was then 85.6%.
With the old 94% threshold, Aave planned to keep about 173.5 million USDT unborrowed when the market reached its optimal level. Switching to 92% raises this theoretical margin to 231.4 million.
That is an additional 57.8 million USDT. However, beware: Aave did not inject this amount into its reserves. It is a margin calculated based on the new parameters. For it to materialize, some borrowers must repay their positions or new depositors must bring funds.
The distinction matters particularly in crypto finance, where withdrawals depend directly on available liquidity.
Aave already knows the consequences of strong withdrawal demand. After the crisis caused by the KelpDAO hack, the protocol recorded 8.45 billion dollars worth of withdrawals in less than 48 hours. The episode fueled discussions about risk management and the resilience of major DeFi protocols.
Crypto Users Are Not Paying 7% Yet
The new curve does not mean that all USDT borrowers now pay 7% interest. This rate corresponds to a hypothetical situation where 94% of liquidity would be used. On October 23, Aave showed about 2.89 billion USDT deposited, 2.50 billion variable debt, and 391.4 million USDT actually available in its Ethereum V3 Core reserve.
The utilization rate was around 86.45%. At this level, the variable borrowing rate reached 4.23%, while liquidity providers earned about 3.29%. Crypto users thus retain conditions relatively close to those seen before the change, as long as utilization remains below the new threshold.
The protocol continues its development in parallel. Its DAO had notably considered a crypto app combining stablecoins, savings, and lending. This expansion requires sufficiently liquid reserves to absorb withdrawal requests, including during periods of high activity. Aave now prefers to raise rates earlier rather than wait until almost all available USDT are borrowed. For lenders and borrowers alike, the 92% threshold thus becomes a new benchmark to monitor.
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Lydie M.
Enseignante et ingénieure IT, Lydie découvre le Bitcoin en 2022 et plonge dans l’univers des cryptomonnaies. Elle vulgarise des sujets complexes, décrypte les enjeux du Web3 et défend une vision d’un futur numérique ouvert, inclusif et décentralisé.
DISCLAIMER
The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this article belong solely to the author, and should not be taken as investment advice. Do your own research before taking any investment decisions.
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
Disclosure. PANews may publish sponsored content, partner content, advertisements, affiliate links, event promotions, and market commentary involving Web3 projects, service providers, or financial products. PANews personnel, contributors, or affiliates may hold digital assets or other interests related to covered topics. See our Terms of Service.
Update (Oct. 23, 6:27 pm UTC): This article has been updated to include a response from Tether.
Senator Richard Blumenthal has requested information from Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino after a Wall Street Journal report said that the stablecoin issuer had inked a $6.3 million deal with a marketing company co-founded by former White House crypto adviser Bo Hines.
In a Thursday letter to Ardoino, the Connecticut lawmaker said that the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations demanded “records and information related to contracts, payments, communications, and lobbying” between Tether and Nxum, Hines’ company. The probe into Nxum, Tether and Hines, according to Blumental, was part of what the senator called the Trump administration’s “self-enrichment and self-dealings with cryptocurrency firms.”
“While Hines failed to divest his one-third stake in Nxum [...] he worked closely over encrypted messaging applications with Nxum to coordinate lobbying, advocacy, and browbeating of members of Congress that were opposed to, or had sought changes to, pending stablecoin legislation,” said Blumenthal. “Those messages also reportedly demonstrate that Tether was directly coordinating Nxum’s lobbying efforts on the GENIUS Act which would regulate stablecoins, with CEO Paolo Ardoino demanding that Nxum ‘obliterate’ the legislation’s opponents.”
The lawmaker added:
“The highly unusual terms and nature of Tether’s business relationship with both Nxum and Bo Hines raise alarming ethical and legal concerns, indicating that Tether was likely well aware of the illegality and impropriety of issuing payments to a current White House official with such a direct role in shaping cryptocurrency legislation that was instrumental to its business.”Hines worked as executive director as President’s Council of Advisers on Digital Assets from January to August 2025, when he left the White House to join Tether as a “strategic adviser.” He later became CEO of Tether US. Harry Jung, another crypto adviser in the Trump administration, left his position in July 2026 and joined Nxum as a managing director in August.
A Tether spokesperson told Cointelegraph that the company was aware of the allegations and an external counsel ”found no evidence of wrongdoing” after a previous ”in-depth internal investigation into the matter.”
Trump, his family and members of his administration continue to face scrutiny over accusations that they are reaping financial windfalls from crypto policies on laws over which they have control or influence. The president disclosed earning $1.4 billion from investments related to crypto in 2025.
Crypto ties could be a factor in midterm electionsWhile Blumenthal has limited authority as the Democratic ranking member of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, the results of the 2026 midterm elections could potentially change party control in the House of Representatives and Senate. This could give the Connecticut lawmaker and other Democratic additional authority to conduct investigations into Trump and his administration’s ties to the crypto industry, including those which could present conflicts of interest.
As of Friday, event contracts on prediction market platforms Kalshi and Polymarket favored Democrats retaking majority control of both chambers of Congress in 2027, with 92% and 68% chances on Kalshi for the House and Senate, respectively. US Election Day is on Nov. 3.
Magazine: New DeepSeek ban in US, Swiss-Asia crypto ties deepen: Asia Express
Update (Oct. 23, 6:27 pm UTC): This article has been updated to include a response from Tether.
Senator Richard Blumenthal has requested information from Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino after a Wall Street Journal report said that the stablecoin issuer had inked a $6.3 million deal with a marketing company co-founded by former White House crypto adviser Bo Hines.
In a Thursday letter to Ardoino, the Connecticut lawmaker said that the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations demanded “records and information related to contracts, payments, communications, and lobbying” between Tether and Nxum, Hines’ company. The probe into Nxum, Tether and Hines, according to Blumental, was part of what the senator called the Trump administration’s “self-enrichment and self-dealings with cryptocurrency firms.”
“While Hines failed to divest his one-third stake in Nxum [...] he worked closely over encrypted messaging applications with Nxum to coordinate lobbying, advocacy, and browbeating of members of Congress that were opposed to, or had sought changes to, pending stablecoin legislation,” said Blumenthal. “Those messages also reportedly demonstrate that Tether was directly coordinating Nxum’s lobbying efforts on the GENIUS Act which would regulate stablecoins, with CEO Paolo Ardoino demanding that Nxum ‘obliterate’ the legislation’s opponents.”
The lawmaker added:
“The highly unusual terms and nature of Tether’s business relationship with both Nxum and Bo Hines raise alarming ethical and legal concerns, indicating that Tether was likely well aware of the illegality and impropriety of issuing payments to a current White House official with such a direct role in shaping cryptocurrency legislation that was instrumental to its business.”Hines worked as executive director as President’s Council of Advisers on Digital Assets from January to August 2025, when he left the White House to join Tether as a “strategic adviser.” He later became CEO of Tether US. Harry Jung, another crypto adviser in the Trump administration, left his position in July 2026 and joined Nxum as a managing director in August.
A Tether spokesperson told Cointelegraph that the company was aware of the allegations and an external counsel ”found no evidence of wrongdoing” after a previous ”in-depth internal investigation into the matter.”
Trump, his family and members of his administration continue to face scrutiny over accusations that they are reaping financial windfalls from crypto policies on laws over which they have control or influence. The president disclosed earning $1.4 billion from investments related to crypto in 2025.
Crypto ties could be a factor in midterm electionsWhile Blumenthal has limited authority as the Democratic ranking member of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, the results of the 2026 midterm elections could potentially change party control in the House of Representatives and Senate. This could give the Connecticut lawmaker and other Democratic additional authority to conduct investigations into Trump and his administration’s ties to the crypto industry, including those which could present conflicts of interest.
As of Friday, event contracts on prediction market platforms Kalshi and Polymarket favored Democrats retaking majority control of both chambers of Congress in 2027, with 92% and 68% chances on Kalshi for the House and Senate, respectively. US Election Day is on Nov. 3.
Magazine: New DeepSeek ban in US, Swiss-Asia crypto ties deepen: Asia Express
Sen. Richard Blumenthal said he wants answers from Tether following reports that the stablecoin issuer paid millions of dollars to a consulting firm started by former White House crypto adviser Bo Hines and his father amid negotiations to pass stablecoin legislation into law.
The Connecticut Democrat said that relationship raised legal and ethical concerns, in a letter sent to Tether and Hines.
"Tether’s alleged multimillion-dollar payment to a firm controlled by the White House official primarily responsible for cryptocurrency policy implicates federal ethics, anticorruption, and lobbying laws," Blumenthal said on Thursday.
Last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that Tether had started a business relationship with Nxum — a consulting firm started by Bo Hines and his father — weeks after Hines took the helm as the White House's top crypto advisor. During Hines' time at the White House, he played a pivotal role in passing the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins, or GENIUS Act, which created the first federal regulatory framework for stablecoins.
Tether, which issues the world's largest stablecoin, became an advocate for the GENIUS Act and, through it, launched the U.S.-based version of its flagship stablecoin, called USAT.
A Tether spokesperson told The Block that the company is reviewing the letter. "Tether is aware of the allegations reported in The Wall Street Journal that form the basis of Senator Blumenthal’s letter," the spokesperson said. "External counsel previously conducted an in-depth internal investigation into the matter, which found no evidence of wrongdoing."
Lawmakers, including Blumenthal, have repeatedly scrutinized Tether over the past year. Last month, Blumenthal released findings of an investigation that found that Tether had become central in "Iran's shadow banking system" and the financing activities of terrorist groups. Tether has pushed back and said it helps authorities find bad actors.
In Blumenthal's latest letter, he asked Tether to provide records involving the stablecoin issuer's business dealings with Nxum as well as with Hines.
Blumenthal also sent a letter on Thursday to Nxum. Harry Jung, the now-former deputy director of the President's Council of Advisors for Digital Assets who worked with Hines, is now at Nxum, according to his X account.
Leadership at the council is also absent now following the departure of Patrick Witt last week after his detail expired. Witt did not say where he would be going next, but said in a post on X that he looked forward to advancing his mission in the private sector.
In brief Sen. Richard Blumenthal asked Tether to hand over records on its dealings with Bo Hines and his consulting firm, Nxum, by Nov. 3. The Wall Street Journal reported that Nxum earned $6.3 million from a Tether deal struck while Hines, who kept a one-third stake, helped craft the GENIUS Act. A Nxum representative said Hines wasn’t involved in the deal and received no Tether-derived funds while in government. Tether is facing fresh scrutiny in the Senate over millions of dollars that reportedly flowed to a firm co-owned by Bo Hines while he helped shape U.S. stablecoin law at the White House.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., the top Democrat on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, sent Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino a letter Thursday demanding records of the company’s dealings with Hines and Nxum, the consulting firm he co-founded. Blumenthal gave Tether until Nov. 3 to respond.
Myriad: Who will win the midterms? Click to make your prediction.Hines was executive director of President Donald Trump’s Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets and a key architect of the GENIUS Act, signed in July 2025. He left the White House on Aug. 9, 2025, and Tether named him CEO of its new U.S. division the following month.
Blumenthal’s letter builds on an Oct. 14 Wall Street Journal investigation. The Journal reported that Nxum has earned $6.3 million from a deal Tether struck in May 2025. Tether agreed to pay a marketing firm, Notorious, $415,000 a month, and the firm passed most of the first payment to a wallet used by Nxum, where it was split three ways. Later payments went directly to Nxum after Hines left government. Hines kept his one-third stake in Nxum while serving in the White House, the Journal reported.
The Journal also reported that Hines urged lawmakers to double the law’s compliance window from 18 to 36 months, a change that chiefly benefited Tether. Messages it reviewed showed Hines sharing talking points about Republican holdouts with his Nxum partners. After a call from Ardoino, Hines’ father and Nxum co-owner, Todd Hines, wrote: “They want us to obliterate these members that are fighting crypto.”
A Nxum representative told the Journal that Hines wasn’t involved in the Tether deal while in government and “did not receive any Tether-derived funds during that period.”
“Tether is aware of the allegations reported in The Wall Street Journal that form the basis of Senator Blumenthal’s letter,” Tether today said in a statement. “External counsel previously conducted an in-depth internal investigation into the matter, which found no evidence of wrongdoing.”
Blumenthal wrote that the payment structure suggests Tether “was likely well aware of the illegality and impropriety” of paying a sitting official, and that the arrangement “implicates federal ethics, anticorruption, and lobbying laws.” He also asked about a Nxum pitch deck, reported by the Journal, saying Tether would buy a 25% stake in the firm for $56 million.
It’s Blumenthal’s second Tether-linked letter this month. On Oct. 8, he asked Cantor Fitzgerald, Tether’s reserve custodian and a 5% shareholder chaired by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s son, for records on that relationship.
That letter followed a report from his staff finding that most Iran-linked wallets used USDT. Tether responded by citing about $550 million in Iran-linked freezes, including $344 million in April.
Lutnick defended Tether at his confirmation hearing last year, and Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ron Wyden pressed him in April over a reported Tether loan to a trust for his children.
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Tether, the issuer behind the largest U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin, is under increasing scrutiny in Washington after reports linked millions of dollars in payments to a consulting firm co-founded by Bo Hines. Hines played a significant role shaping stablecoin legislation while serving in the White House.
Senate probe targets Tether’s payments and ties to NxumSenator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut and the top Democrat on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, has demanded that Tether share records concerning its business relationship with Bo Hines and Nxum, the consulting company Hines helped establish. Blumenthal requested the information in a letter to Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino, giving the firm until November 3 to respond.
A Wall Street Journal investigation indicated that Nxum earned $6.3 million from a deal Tether executed in May 2025. Initially, Tether paid $415,000 monthly to marketing agency Notorious, which reportedly forwarded most of the first installment to a wallet controlled by Nxum and divided the funds among three partners. Subsequent payments reportedly went straight to Nxum after Hines stepped down from his government role in August 2025.
Bo Hines previously served as executive director of President Donald Trump’s Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets. He became CEO of Tether’s U.S. operations after leaving the White House.
The Journal further detailed internal messages suggesting Hines remained active within Nxum during his government tenure. According to the report, Hines advocated for an extension to the GENIUS Act’s compliance window, which ultimately favored Tether’s interests, while his father, Nxum co-owner Todd Hines, discussed targeting lawmakers critical of digital assets.
A Nxum spokesperson denied Hines participated in the Tether agreement while in government and maintained he received no funds derived from Tether during that time.
Tether acknowledged the Wall Street Journal’s allegations in a statement, emphasizing that external counsel previously conducted a thorough review and found no sign of misconduct. Blumenthal countered these assertions by stating the structure of payments suggested Tether could have been aware of “illegality and impropriety,” potentially violating federal ethics, anticorruption, and lobbying laws.
Tether stated that its external counsel “previously conducted an in-depth internal investigation into the matter, which found no evidence of wrongdoing.” A spokesperson for Nxum said that Hines did not receive any Tether-related funds during his time in government and was not involved in the deal.
Blumenthal also raised concerns about a Nxum pitch to Tether, reported by the Journal, that outlined a possible purchase of a 25% stake in the consulting firm for $56 million.
Mini dictionary: Nxum is a consulting firm co-founded by Bo Hines and Todd Hines. The company has reportedly been involved in advisory services related to digital assets and legislative matters.
Tether’s role in sanctioned crypto activity draws further scrutinyParallel to the payment probe, Senator Blumenthal released a report by Senate Democratic staff noting that of 846 cryptocurrency wallets sanctioned or flagged for seizure due to suspected ties to Iran or its regional allies, 84% processed transactions exclusively or almost entirely in Tether’s USDT stablecoin.
The report, titled “Tethered to Terrorism,” references blockchain analysis of wallets named by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control. Blumenthal argued that these findings point to Tether’s utility in circumventing international sanctions on Iran. Tether responded to these concerns by noting it had frozen approximately $550 million in Iran-linked wallets, with $344 million frozen as recently as April.
Number of walletsLinked to IranUsed USDT almost exclusively846Sanctioned or seized84%Blumenthal has also sought information from Cantor Fitzgerald, Tether’s reserve custodian and a 5% shareholder, concerning its relationship with Tether. This followed reports that Cantor Fitzgerald’s chair, Howard Lutnick, defended Tether at his Senate confirmation hearing, and that Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ron Wyden questioned Lutnick about a Tether loan to a trust for his children.
These parallel investigations highlight growing concerns about Tether’s financial and regulatory practices amid its central role in the global stablecoin market.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal is demanding records from Tether over reported multimillion-dollar payments to a consulting firm co-founded by Bo Hines, the White House’s former top crypto adviser.
Blumenthal, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said Thursday he had sent letters to Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino and to Nxum, the consulting firm Hines started with his father, in a press release from his office. The letters request records and information related to contracts, payments, communications and lobbying between Tether and Nxum. A third letter reportedly went to Hines himself.
The inquiry targets payments Blumenthal’s letter describes as exceeding $6 million, reportedly under a strategic communications arrangement that began weeks after Hines took office. Hines led the President’s Council of Advisers on Digital Assets from January to August 2025, then joined Tether as a strategic adviser and later became chief executive of Tether US. During his White House tenure he helped steer the GENIUS Act, the first federal framework for stablecoins, through Congress, and Tether launched its US-based stablecoin USAT under the new law.
“Tether’s alleged multimillion-dollar payment to a firm controlled by the White House official primarily responsible for cryptocurrency policy implicates federal ethics, anticorruption, and lobbying laws,” Blumenthal said in the letter.
Tether pushed back. A company spokesperson said Tether is aware of the allegations that form the basis of the senator’s letter, and that “external counsel previously conducted an in-depth internal investigation into the matter, which found no evidence of wrongdoing.” The company, which issues the world’s largest stablecoin, said it was still reviewing the letter.
It is the senator’s second move against Tether in a month. Last month his office released findings that Tether had become central in Iran’s shadow banking system and the financing activities of terrorist groups, which Tether disputed at the time, saying it helps authorities find bad actors. The new letter is an inquiry and does not establish that Tether, Hines or Nxum acted unlawfully.
A major political and judicial storm has just erupted at the heart of the American crypto ecosystem. The issuer of the USDT stablecoin, Tether, is under fire from a federal investigation led by the United States Senate. At the center of the accusations is the payment of several million dollars to a senior White House official aimed at influencing the regulation of digital assets and tailoring laws to measure.
In brief
The US Senate is officially investigating the issuer of the USDT stablecoin, Tether.
Tether allegedly paid $6.3 million to a firm linked to Bo Hines, then a crypto adviser at the White House.
These funds allegedly served to negotiate strategic relaxations under the GENIUS Act.
The chairman of the Senate investigative subcommittee demands all contracts and exchanges be handed over under threat of sanctions.
Crypto: $6.3 Million Paid by Tether to the White House
The case broke out following an investigative report published by the Wall Street Journal. According to the economic daily’s revelations, Tether allegedly paid about $6.3 million to a consulting firm called Nxum. A major issue is that this firm was co-founded and partially owned by Bo Hines, at the very time when he was acting as senior adviser on digital asset and crypto policies at the White House.
Wall Street Journal article on Tether’s transaction to Bo Hines.
To conceal this direct financial link between the USDT issuer and the executive adviser in office, the payments were allegedly not made transparently. The report indicates that Tether routed its crypto funds through an intermediary agency (Notorious), which then transferred them to Nxum. This arrangement aimed to bypass the strict ethical controls imposed on officials in the US administration.
Entity involvedRole in the caseAmount / Key actionTether (USDT)Issuer of the stablecoin$6.3 million paid via intermediariesBo HinesWhite House crypto adviser / CEO of Tether U.S.Modification of the GENIUS Act & conflict of interestNxum GroupIntermediary consulting companyRecipient of secret fundsUS Senate (Richard Blumenthal)Parliamentary investigation body (PSI)Official injunction set for November 6, 2026Data compiled by Cointribune.
Genius Act: A Tailor-Made Law for USDT? The US Senate’s Reaction
The consequences of these suspicious payments apparently quickly manifested on the legislative front. During his tenure at the White House, Bo Hines weighed heavily in negotiations surrounding the GENIUS Act, a key law aimed at regulating stablecoins in the United States. He reportedly obtained strategic exemptions and an extension of the compliance timeline from 18 to 36 months, thus offering crucial relief to Tether to continue its crypto operations without risk of blockage.
Only a few weeks after leaving the government in August 2025, Bo Hines executed a perfect “revolving door” move by becoming CEO of the American branch, Tether U.S. Faced with these revelations, the political reaction was swift. Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal, chairman of the United States Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI), officially seized the case:
The alleged payment of several million dollars by Tether to a company controlled by the White House official primarily responsible for crypto policy calls into question federal laws on ethics, anti-corruption, and lobbying.
Ultimatum by November 6 for Tether: What Does the Crypto Company Risk?
The US Senate immediately took action by sending formal injunction letters to Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether, as well as to Nxum’s management. Lawmakers demand the submission of all contracts, financial statements, and encrypted message exchanges by November 6, 2026. Investigators are particularly interested in internal directives from Tether’s management instructing to “crush” any opposition to their legislative amendments.
This procedure exposes Tether to significant legal and operational risks in the United States. If suspicions of violations of anti-corruption and illegal lobbying laws are confirmed, the repercussions could go beyond simple financial fines. While Tether seeks to strengthen its presence on American soil with Tether U.S., this political scandal could severely undermine institutional trust and push regulators to impose unprecedented constraints on the crypto market.
This political interference scandal in crypto calls into question Tether’s lobbying methods and casts a shadow over the negotiations of the GENIUS Act in the United States. Do you think this US Senate investigation could weaken the dominant position of USDT against its regulated competitors?
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Eddy S.
The world is evolving and adaptation is the best weapon to survive in this undulating universe. Originally a crypto community manager, I am interested in anything that is directly or indirectly related to blockchain and its derivatives. To share my experience and promote a field that I am passionate about, nothing is better than writing informative and relaxed articles.
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Tether (USDT) on BNB Chain recorded $3.69T in 30-day transfers, about 2.5 times Tron and Ethereum combined, per rwa.xyz, despite a far smaller supply.
$USDT on @BNBCHAIN recorded $3.69T across 471 million transfers over the past 30 days, about 2.5 times the combined total of Tron and Ethereum, according to data from rwa.xyz. The figure places BNB Chain well ahead of the two networks that hold most of Tether's supply.
Small supply, very high turnoverThe activity comes from a much smaller base. USDT on BNB Chain stands at $9.18B, compared with roughly $92B on Tron and $75B on Ethereum. On rwa.xyz's asset page, the BNB Chain supply is listed at about $9.18B, tagged as a bridged token rather than a native one.
That gap implies very different usage patterns. Each dollar of USDT on BNB Chain changes hands about 400 times a month, compared with roughly 8 to 9 times on Tron and Ethereum. The two larger networks hold far more supply, but much of it appears to sit in wallets, custody and exchange balances for longer periods.
Transaction counts point the same way. Data from the ACHIVX stablecoin scanner, which tracks settled USDT flows, shows BNB Chain carrying the most USDT transfers of any network at much smaller average sizes than Tron or Ethereum. That pattern is consistent with high-frequency, low-value activity rather than large settlement transfers.
What the totals includeThe headline numbers count every transfer, including trading bots and contract activity. They are a measure of onchain movement, not of unique users or organic payment demand, and repeated transfers of the same funds are counted each time.
There is also a technical caveat on what "USDT on BNB Chain" means. According to an explainer citing Tether data, Tether-issued supply on BNB Smart Chain is $0, and the BEP-20 token there is Binance-Peg BSC-USD. Aggregators such as rwa.xyz classify it as bridged USDT, which is why it appears under the USDT label.
Tron remains the largest USDT network by supply. Datawallet, citing DefiLlama, put Tron's USDT at about $92.4 billion on 1 October 2026, roughly half of global USDT in circulation. The BNB Chain figures show that supply and activity can diverge sharply, and that raw transfer volume says little on its own about where stablecoin capital actually sits.
Sources
RWA.xyz: Tether USDt asset data
ACHIVX: USDT transfers by network
Datawallet: TRC20 USDT market data
The ranking member of the Senate’s investigations subcommittee gave Tether and Nxum until early November to turn over contracts, payment details and messages tied to the firm co-founded by Tether’s U.S. chief.
Blumenthal probes Tether links to Bo Hines' Nxum
Original Image Credits: Xuthoria, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Posted October 23, 2026 at 6:45 am ET.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), the ranking member of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, demanded records on Oct. 22 from Tether and from Nxum Group, a consulting firm co-founded by former White House crypto official Bo Hines. The request covers millions of dollars Tether reportedly paid the firm while Hines was working on stablecoin policy.
Blumenthal sent one letter to Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino and a second to Nxum CEO Todd Hines, Bo Hines’ father. Both set a Nov. 3, 2026 deadline and ask for contracts, payment details and communications involving Nxum, Bo Hines and related parties.
“Tether’s alleged multimillion-dollar payment to a firm controlled by the White House official primarily responsible for cryptocurrency policy implicates federal ethics, anticorruption, and lobbying laws,” Blumenthal wrote.
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What the Letters Cite The letters build on an Oct. 14 report by The Wall Street Journal, which Unchained covered on Oct. 15. The WSJ reported, according to the letters, that Tether agreed in May 2025 to pay Nxum $415,000 a month, and more than $6 million moved from Tether to Nxum overall. Hines, then executive director of the White House’s crypto council, did not divest his one-third stake in the firm, the letter says, citing the paper.
Messages reviewed by the WSJ reportedly show Tether steering Nxum’s lobbying on the GENIUS Act, with Ardoino demanding that Nxum “obliterate” the bill’s opponents, according to the letter. Blumenthal wrote that Hines pushed for changes giving Tether more time to comply and room to keep operating offshore, provisions he said became known as the “Tether loophole.”
The letter says Tether first routed its crypto payments through a marketing firm, Notorious, led by Peter Vincer, and began paying Nxum directly only after Hines left government. Nxum later allegedly offered Notorious’ director more than $300,000 and a share of future Tether payments in return for a nondisclosure agreement, Blumenthal wrote.
Questions for Both Firms Blumenthal asked Tether to break down every payment, including any wallet addresses used, and to hand over its records involving Hines from Jan. 20, 2025, to Aug. 9, 2025. Both letters ask whether Tether and Nxum have discussed Tether taking a stake in Nxum. The question follows the WSJ’s report that Nxum, while seeking new investment, claimed Tether planned to buy a 25% stake for $56 million. The Nxum letter also states that the firm never registered its lobbying with the House or Senate.
Hines left the White House in August 2025, and Tether announced on Aug. 19, 2025, that it had hired him as a strategic adviser. He now runs Tether’s U.S. operations.
A Nxum representative reportedly told the WSJ that Hines had no involvement in Tether business while he served in government. Blumenthal has separately urged Treasury and the Justice Department to investigate Tether over Iran’s use of USDT.
Related Listen: Tether Freezes Stolen Funds. Circle Doesn’t. Why?
AI-assisted content: This article was produced with the assistance of AI tools and was reviewed, edited, and fact-checked by a member of the Unchained editorial team before publication.
Former White House crypto adviser Bo Hines, who is CEO of Tether's U.S. arm, is under scrutiny from a Senate Democrat for payments made to his consulting firm. (Jesse Hamilton/CoinDesk)Summary
U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal keeps digging into Tether on behalf of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, this time looking at recent reports that a firm owned by former White House crypto adviser Bo Hines took millions while he was still helping shape stablecoin policy. Blumenthal, the ranking Democrat on the subcommittee, sent letters to Tether and the firm, Nxum, that was co-founded by Hines, who took a job as Tether’s top U.S. executive after leaving the White House. U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal has added another Tether probe to the many irons he has in crypto fires, this time demanding answers about reported payments the company made to a firm owned by Bo Hines — the former White House crypto adviser who is now in charge of the U.S. arm of Tether.
Blumenthal, the ranking Democrat on the Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, sent letters Thursday to Tether and to the consulting company Hines started with his father and another partner, Nxum Group.
"The highly unusual terms and nature of Tether’s business relationship with both Nxum and Bo Hines raise alarming ethical and legal concerns, indicating that Tether was likely well aware of the illegality and impropriety of issuing payments to a current White House official with such a direct role in shaping cryptocurrency legislation that was instrumental to its business," Blumenthal wrote to Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino.
The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Nxum had received large payments for consulting work for Tether when Hines was still advising President Donald Trump and his administration on crypto policy (including on stablecoin issuers significant to Tether). Blumenthal requested details of those business arrangements.
“Tether is aware of the allegations reported in The Wall Street Journal that form the basis of Senator Blumenthal’s letter,” the company said in a statement. “External counsel previously conducted an in-depth internal investigation into the matter, which found no evidence of wrongdoing.”
CoinDesk had been first to report earlier that Hines' company — which had little track record or experience in politics — was making millions of dollars as the main campaign-advertising provider for a political action committee associated with Tether.
Hines' family firm, Nxum, has recently hired another official that worked as a White House crypto adviser, Harry Jung. The office that advised Trump on crypto issues has since gone vacant, with the departure of Patrick Witt, who had replaced Hines as its executive director.
Blumenthal has been focusing significant attention on crypto, including on Trump's memecoin, crypto backers of the president's projects, Trump family crypto firm World Liberty Financial, activities at Binance and especially on Tether. He issued a report on its financial connections to Iran, and he more recently demanded answers about Tether's connection to its U.S. financial partner, Cantor Fitzgerald.
Tether's Ardoino criticized the senator's work this week, saying Blumenthal ignored important information and shared his report with the press before giving the company a look or a chance to respond.
Though Blumenthal's party has been in the Senate minority during Trump's time in office, the still-narrow odds of Democrats taking back that chamber have improved in recent weeks. If Blumenthal returns to chair the investigations subcommittee, it would grant him significantly greater powers to subpoena and control the agenda, and he's made it clear that crypto would be high on his list of topic areas. Prediction market Kalshi gives Democrats a 69% chance at the moment.
Read More: Top Democrat among Senate investigators probes ties between Cantor Fitzgerald, Tether
UPDATE (October 22, 2026, 23:36 UTC): Adds comment from Tether.
The largest U.S. public pension fund has significantly reduced its holdings in the "Magnificent Seven" tech stocks, shifting to increase allocations to private equity.
According to a Financial Times report, CalPERS, the largest U.S. public pension fund (California Public Employees' Retirement System), is adjusting its asset allocation: cutting direct holdings of the "Magnificent Seven" tech giants while increasing exposure to private equity to reduce concentration risk in public equity investments. Calculations from regulatory filings show CalPERS will slash its direct holdings of stocks in Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Nvidia, Meta, and Tesla by 26% in the first half of 2026. The fund is instead diversifying its portfolio across hundreds of companies, cutting concentrated bets on a small number of top firms. Anton Orlich, CalPERS' deputy chief investment officer, confirmed this allocation shift in an interview. He noted that public equity market valuations are already elevated, and concentration in a handful of leading companies is pressuring relative returns. In contrast, private companies offer more attractive pricing, helping CalPERS buffer against potential downturns in public markets. This rebalancing took place ahead of the recent tech stock sell-off. This week, multiple tech giants released earnings reports, stoking market concerns over whether AI spending can translate into tangible returns. Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet are set to report results next week, leaving the tech sector facing further tests. As of June 30, CalPERS' assets under management reached $637.1 billion. Data released by the fund in July showed its preliminary net investment return for the past 12 months was 14.8%, with both public and private equity portfolios performing strongly.
3 minutes ago
Hong Kong's Secretary for the Treasury: Hong Kong's tokenization initiative is advancing towards the implementation phase.
Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Hui Ching Yu, stated that Hong Kong’s tokenization development is transitioning from the "experimental phase" to the "implementation phase". Currently, Hong Kong hosts over 1,400 fintech enterprises, including 8 virtual banks, 4 virtual insurance companies, and 12 licensed virtual asset trading platforms, which have achieved notable results in advancing tokenization. Hui added that the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (HKEX) is committed to launching a tokenized warehouse receipt financing pilot program next year. The project will partner with designated banks, utilizing distributed ledger technology, to facilitate the use of commodity warehouse receipts as collateral. Furthermore, HKEX is also developing a multi-asset tokenization platform that will include commodity warehouse receipts from approved warehouses.
3 minutes ago
South Korea's KOSPI index closed 0.3% higher, with SK Hynix gaining 4.41%.
According to Bitget's market data, South Korea's KOSPI index closed up 16.53 points on Friday, October 23, with a 0.3% gain, ending at 5550.3 points. SK Hynix closed 4.41% higher, while Samsung Electronics rose 0.46%.
3 minutes ago
He Yi reposted Binance's Agent wallet risk alert, warning of transaction risks associated with the Agent developer mode.
Jackson.ll (@0xOar), developer of Binance Wallet’s web version, posted today, stating: “Agent ID is being used in various ways, but users should also carefully check risk warnings. Enabling developer mode for the Agent means you can sign unverified contract transactions... Potential risks need attention. You can close the mode immediately after minting, or wait for products from verified developers.” He Yi subsequently retweeted the post. Earlier reports indicated that multiple minting projects exclusive to Binance Agent Wallet have recently emerged in the market, with some requiring developer mode activation.
3 minutes ago
YuShu Technology, listed on China's A-share market, surges to its 20% daily limit, with its shares rising over 46% cumulatively this week.
Alliance Partner on a16z’s Shift: To Drive Crypto Talent to Build Cutting-Edge Technology
Imran, general partner at Alliance, took to X this morning to share his views on a16z crypto’s shift toward frontier technology sectors. He noted that a16z led Coinbase’s 2013 funding round via Chris Dixon, providing early validation for the crypto industry; Marc Andreessen’s 2014 New York Times op-ed, “Why Bitcoin Matters,” was a key factor in his decision to enter the Bitcoin space. At the time, few institutions and funds were willing to publicly back crypto, with a16z and USV standing out as two that took brand risk. Imran argued that the current development of AI infrastructure owes much to Bitcoin mining infrastructure and talent that has moved from crypto to AI. The shift to frontier technologies including robotics, biotech, AI, energy, and computing power means the talent and capabilities the crypto industry has built over the past decade can be applied to the broader frontier tech space. Citing data centers as an example, he noted that public and government pushback against data centers is growing, much like earlier resistance to crypto—yet today nearly all traditional financial institutions have embraced crypto to some extent. Yesterday’s news: a16z’s flagship blockchain fund will drop the “Crypto” moniker and rebrand as “a16z Frontier.”
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
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Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
Disclosure. PANews may publish sponsored content, partner content, advertisements, affiliate links, event promotions, and market commentary involving Web3 projects, service providers, or financial products. PANews personnel, contributors, or affiliates may hold digital assets or other interests related to covered topics. See our Terms of Service.
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
Disclosure. PANews may publish sponsored content, partner content, advertisements, affiliate links, event promotions, and market commentary involving Web3 projects, service providers, or financial products. PANews personnel, contributors, or affiliates may hold digital assets or other interests related to covered topics. See our Terms of Service.
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Geneva, Switzerland, October 22, 2026 — TRON reinforced its position as a leading blockchain network for stablecoin settlement in the third quarter of 2026, with trillions in transaction volume, record USDT supply, growing payment card adoption, and the debut of the first U.S. spot staked TRX exchange-traded fund (ETF), according to independent research reports from CoinDesk Data and Nansen.
CoinDesk
CoinDesk’s TRON Network Quarterly Report: Q3 2026 provides a technical assessment of the TRON network from July to September 2026. The findings span network and ecosystem developments, core on-chain metrics, and DeFi activity across lending and decentralized exchanges (DEX).
Key Insights from CoinDesk:
Stablecoin Settlement: TRON accounted for approximately 73% of stablecoin transfer volume at the end of Q3 2026, the highest share among blockchain networks. Stablecoin Market Share & USDT Growth: USDT on TRON reached an all-time high of just over $92.7 billion in Q3 2026, lifting TRON’s share of the total USDT market to a 2026 high of 50.6% in mid-September. TRON’s share of total stablecoin market capitalization also rose to 30.2%. Crypto-Card Payments & DeFi Activity: TRON ranked first among chains by crypto-card payment volume in Q3 2026, capturing a 27.5% share worth approximately $638 million as total card volumes grew 60.5% QoQ to $2.32 billion. Total value locked (TVL) on the network rose 26.6% QoQ to $5.7 billion with lending the largest sector at 68%, and JustLend active loans up from $127M to $199M. Read the full report from CoinDesk here.
Nansen
Nansen’s TRON Quarterly Report: Q3 2026 examines the network’s settlement scale and on-chain behavior over the quarter. It covers stablecoin settlement volume, transaction and address activity, institutional developments, and how users and transactions are distributed across labeled entities on TRON.
Key Insights from Nansen:
Stablecoin Settlement at Scale: TRON settled $2.21 trillion in stablecoins in Q3 2026, with average daily settlement rising 3.9% to $24.05 billion. Cumulative transaction volume on the network also surpassed $30 trillion as of September 23. User Growth & On-Chain Activity: TRON’s user base continued to grow in Q3 2026, with average rolling monthly active addresses up 9.8% QoQ to 18 million, while the network processed an average of 11.68 million successful transactions per day. Expanded Institutional Access: Canary Capital launched the Canary Staked TRX ETF (TRXS), the first U.S. spot staked TRX ETF, on September 9, and TRON DAO rang the Cboe closing bell on September 29 to mark its debut. Anchorage Digital also added native TRX staking and TRC-20 custody as the second phase of its TRON integration. Read the full report from Nansen here.
Across both reports, TRON’s third quarter showed a network growing in volume and in reach at the same time. Stablecoin settlement continued to climb, everyday spending through crypto cards accelerated, and new regulated products gave institutions a direct path to TRX. With that foundation in place, TRON enters the final quarter of 2026 as a settlement network that is increasingly accessible to retail users and institutions alike.
About TRON DAO
TRON DAO is a community-governed DAO dedicated to accelerating the decentralization of the internet via blockchain technology and dApps.
Founded in September 2017, the TRON blockchain has experienced significant growth since its MainNet launch in May 2018. Today, TRON hosts the largest circulating supply of USD Tether (USDT) stablecoin, which currently exceeds $94 billion. As of October 2026, the TRON blockchain has recorded over 410 million in total user accounts, more than 15 billion in total transactions, and over $28 billion in total value locked (TVL), based on TRONSCAN. Recognized as the global settlement layer for stablecoin transactions and everyday purchases with proven success, TRON is “Moving Trillions, Empowering Billions.”
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Tether has led a pre-seed funding round in Bolivian fintech Peso to expand USDT payments across four Latin American countries, including services that connect stablecoins with food delivery platforms and local banking networks.
Summary
Tether has led an undisclosed pre-seed investment in Bolivian fintech Peso to expand USDT payment services. Peso enables customers to pay for Yango food deliveries in Bolivia using the dollar-pegged stablecoin. The company connects stablecoin wallets with local bank transfers, QR payments and merchant payment terminals. Funding will support Peso’s operations in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina. The investment follows Tether’s recent backing of other payment providers serving Latin American markets. According to Tether’s October 21 announcement, the investment will support Peso’s operations in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina, with funding directed toward payment infrastructure, merchant services and local currency conversion.
Tether backs Peso’s expansion into everyday USDT payments Peso operates a financial application that allows customers to hold USDT, transfer funds internationally, make purchases and access savings and investment services. The company connects digital dollar balances with conventional payment systems used by consumers and businesses.
In Bolivia, Peso has integrated USDT payments into Yango, allowing customers to order food and pay directly with the stablecoin through the delivery platform.
The integration is an existing service, according to Tether’s announcement. However, neither company disclosed the number of transactions processed, participating restaurants or the value of payments completed through Yango.
Peso offers merchant-facing point-of-sale services and QR payments, alongside virtual accounts registered in customers’ names. Through connections with Bolivia’s banking system, users can move funds between USDT and local currency using automated clearing house transfers.
The company intends to develop those services across its four existing markets, concentrating on local deposit and withdrawal arrangements that allow businesses to accept stablecoin payments without operating exclusively within cryptocurrency platforms.
Tether did not disclose the amount invested, Peso’s valuation or the identities of other participants in the financing.
Peso CEO and co-founder Alejandro Terán said the company’s work focuses on making USDT available for routine purchases and international transfers.
“Latin Americans are already using USD₮; what was missing was the infrastructure to spend it in everyday life without friction,” Terán said.
Peso connects USDT with banking and merchant services The planned expansion includes new connections between stablecoins and local financial institutions, allowing users to convert between digital dollars and national currencies.
According to Tether, the fintech will develop its payment terminal network and virtual account infrastructure while connecting settlement services across Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino described the investment as support for payment infrastructure that allows consumers to spend USDT beyond cryptocurrency trading and savings applications.
“Peso is building the kind of everyday-spend infrastructure that turns USD₮ from a savings tool into a payments channel people rely on daily,” Ardoino said.
The announcement identifies e-commerce, retail payments, ride-hailing and banking services among the sectors Peso intends to serve. It does not announce completed integrations with ride-hailing providers or additional commercial partners beyond Yango.
Tether has not provided transaction-cost comparisons or settlement benchmarks for Peso’s existing services. The company’s stated plans include developing payment connections that can operate alongside domestic banking systems.
Bolivia’s stablecoin adoption grows amid dollar shortages Bolivia has seen growing interest in dollar-denominated digital assets amid restrictions on access to foreign currency and changes to the country’s financial system.
A July proposal to recognize USDT contemplated allowing the stablecoin to function as a payment option alongside the boliviano and U.S. dollar. The proposal did not itself establish USDT as legal tender.
In September, the country outlined tighter cryptocurrency oversight, including plans for a supervisory framework covering virtual assets and measures addressing illicit capital movements.
The Central Bank of Bolivia’s 2026 monetary program separately calls for stronger international reserves and changes to foreign exchange arrangements. The bank announced measures in September to make U.S. dollars available to financial institutions under its foreign exchange regulations.
Financial technology companies have continued developing products using stablecoins. On October 20, lending provider Tala announced a partnership with El Dorado to provide eligible wallet users with credit disbursed and repaid in USDT on the Tempo blockchain.
The service is initially intended for Bolivia, with further Latin American expansion planned.
Tether expands Latin American payments investments Peso joins other payment companies receiving investment from Tether as the stablecoin issuer finances infrastructure connecting USDT with local accounts and payment networks.
On October 13, Tether backed EFY Finance’s expansion, supporting a payment provider whose network reaches local accounts in 17 countries, including Bolivia, Colombia and Mexico.
A separate investment in Saber Money’s payment operations was announced on October 16, supporting plans to develop banking relationships and regulatory licenses across Asia-Pacific and the Gulf region.
In Argentina, Tether previously made a reported $20 million investment in digital bank Ualá as part of its financing activities in Latin America.
The July investment in Ualá formed part of the bank’s $197 million fundraising round, which Allianz X led. Tether’s participation was reported separately from the round’s original announcement.
With over four years of experience in covering and tracking the financial markets, Sneha Agrawal is a dedicated Crypto Journalist and Editor with passion for researching and writing the crypto pieces. She is currently leading the Block of Fame, here at CoinGape. She likes to keep track of political, legal and financial happenings all around the world - without which she deems her day incomplete. Apart from her Journalistic endeavours, she is a solo traveler, museum goer, and a keen reader of books.
Tether led a pre-seed funding round in Bolivian fintech Peso but did not disclose the size of the investment.
Peso plans to expand its USDT payment services across Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina.
The company has added USDT payments to Yango’s food delivery service in Bolivia.
Lending platform Tala partnered with digital wallet El Dorado to offer USDT loans on the Tempo blockchain.
Bolivia has turned to stablecoins since 2025 because of a long US dollar shortage and high inflation.
Tether has led a pre-seed funding round in Peso, a fintech company based in Bolivia. The startup offers payments in USDT, Tether’s stablecoin, through food delivery apps and local banking networks.
Tether announced the deal on Wednesday, Oct. 21. The company did not say how much money it invested.
The funding will help Peso grow its stablecoin payment services across Latin America. The company plans to operate in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina.
How Peso Uses USDT
Peso connects USDT with local currencies through banking and merchant payment systems. This lets users move between the stablecoin and their national money.
The company has already added USDT payments to Yango’s food delivery service in Bolivia. Customers can now pay for their food orders using the stablecoin.
Peso also offers QR code payments and point-of-sale services for merchants. These tools let shops accept USDT from customers.
The fintech provides virtual accounts as well. These accounts link to Bolivia’s banking system through ACH transfers.
Other Firms Grow USDT Services in Bolivia
Peso is not the only company building USDT services in Bolivia. On Tuesday, lending platform Tala announced a partnership with El Dorado, a digital wallet.
Under the deal, Tala will offer credit directly through the El Dorado wallet. Eligible customers can receive and repay loans in USDT.
These loans run on the Tempo blockchain. Tala said customers can get access to funds in seconds.
Bolivia has relied more on stablecoins since 2025. The country has faced a long shortage of US dollars along with high inflation.
As foreign currency became harder to get, many businesses started accepting USDT for purchases. The stablecoin is designed to hold the same value as the US dollar.
In November 2025, the Bolivian government announced plans to bring cryptocurrencies and stablecoins into its financial system. This included letting banks offer digital asset custody and crypto-linked financial products.
In June 2026, Bolivia dropped its longstanding currency peg. The dollar shortage continued after that, which pushed up demand for dollar-based options like USDT.
In July 2026, the government began considering a new regulatory framework. The rules would recognize USDT for payments, savings and trade alongside the boliviano and the US dollar.
Tether’s investment in Peso, announced this week, is the latest deal tied to USDT payments in Bolivia. Tala’s USDT lending partnership with El Dorado was announced one day earlier.
CoinDCX co-founder Sumit Gupta initially denied a fresh breach at the Indian crypto exchange. A security researcher had flagged about $15.99 million in Tether (USDT) moving out of wallets tagged to the platform.
Gupta said the addresses belonged to CoinDCX before its July 2025 hack and were compromised in that attack. However, on-chain investigator ZachXBT later said one of those deposit addresses was still sweeping user funds to CoinDCX’s current hot wallet as recently as May 2026. Gupta acknowledged the point and said no user funds would be lost.
A $15.8 Million Transfer Sets Off the AlarmDarcy, chief marketing officer at security firm Salus, raised the alert on X on October 22.
According to the post, CoinDCX’s reported hot wallet and several deposit addresses sent funds to a single TRON address late on October 21 (UTC+8). The outflow totaled roughly 15.99 million USDT and 5,783.81 TRON (TRX).
The largest single transfer moved about 15.82 million USDT. The receiving address then split the money across multiple wallets.
After several rounds of splitting, the funds reached deposit addresses on Binance, OKX, Gate, and other exchanges, Darcy said.
However, CoinDCX’s leadership disputed that any of those wallets still belonged to the exchange.
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CoinDCX Traces the Flagged Wallets to Last Year’s BreachGupta replied to Darcy’s post less than three hours after it went live.
“Thanks for highlighting but this is incorrect and CoinDCX wallets are not breached. Pls don’t spread rumours,” he said.
He explained that Arkham had tagged the addresses to CoinDCX. However, the exchange generated them in January 2025, and they were compromised during the July 2025 attack.
In Gupta’s view, the hackers appear to be reusing those old addresses. He added that the team checked every current central and user address on the exchange.
None of them had sent funds to the flagged addresses, he said. Gupta also noted that all CoinDCX addresses are public on its proof-of-reserves (PoR) page.
The earlier breach cost CoinDCX about $44.2 million in July 2025. At the time, Gupta said attackers hit an internal wallet used for liquidity on a partner exchange, and customer funds stayed safe.
ZachXBT Challenges the ‘Old Wallet’ ExplanationOn-chain investigator ZachXBT disputed Gupta’s account in a post on X.
He said a CoinDCX deposit address beginning with “TQKJQ” was used by a liquidity provider (LP) for 10 months after the July 2025 incident. According to ZachXBT, the address swept user deposits to CoinDCX’s current public hot wallet and received gas fees as recently as April and May 2026.
“Meaning $15.8M in user deposits was unaccounted for by your team,” he wrote.
ZachXBT also questioned the track record of Indian exchanges, naming WazirX and BitBNS alongside CoinDCX. WazirX lost over $230 million in a July 2024 hack.
Gupta replied directly to the post.
“Yes, aware of that. we’re investigating it further, and will share an update soon. We assure that no user funds will be at loss,” he said.
Earlier, Gupta had said the flagged addresses no longer belonged to CoinDCX. This reply marks a shift from that position.
Darcy Points to Wallets on CoinDCX’s Own Reserve ListDarcy then raised the stakes.
“If @CoinDCX was not hacked, then it appears to have stolen its users’ assets itself,” the Salus CMO wrote.
According to Darcy, two addresses listed in CoinDCX’s latest PoR report sent funds to the address identified as the hacker’s (TAg6SZ1HhgVVjUaKY1paQoFBUS2JFrg5bT). The two addresses are:
TFLxNHunhEizmeEdiMyA3r2XGLSKaEznGd TM5r1bNJ2TjZwfS757tPPtr84MwtEjL9qN Darcy added that the hot wallet, TFLxN…, kept distributing 15 TRX for gas both before and after what CoinDCX describes as the hack.
“Are you suggesting that the hackers were handling gas funding distribution for you?” Darcy asked.
Darcy’s tracking shows these amounts reaching exchanges:
OKX: about 5.47 million USDT, plus a separate 50,000 USDT Binance: about 2.02 million USDT Gate: about 1.39 million USDT Some funds also went to addresses linked to Huione and Xinbi. Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic has tied these Telegram-based marketplaces to large-scale money laundering.
CoinDCX had not publicly addressed Darcy’s latest claims at the time of writing. Gupta said the exchange’s official accounts will share more details soon.
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Tether has led a pre-seed funding round in Bolivian fintech Peso, which offers USDT payments through food delivery apps and local banking networks, to support the company’s expansion across Latin America.
In a Wednesday announcement, Tether said the investment will help Peso expand its stablecoin payment infrastructure across Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina, including services that connect USDT with local currencies through banking and merchant payment systems.
Peso has integrated USDT payments into Yango’s food delivery service in Bolivia, allowing customers to pay for orders using the stablecoin. The fintech offers QR payments, point-of-sale services for merchants and virtual accounts linked to Bolivia’s banking system through ACH transfers. Tether did not disclose the size of its investment.
Source: Tether
The investment comes as other fintech companies expand USDT-based financial services in Bolivia. On Tuesday, lending platform Tala announced a partnership with El Dorado to offer credit directly through the digital wallet, allowing eligible customers to receive and repay loans in USDT on the Tempo blockchain.
Bolivia turns to stablecoins amid US dollar shortageBolivia has increasingly turned to stablecoins since 2025 amid a prolonged US dollar shortage and high inflation, with businesses beginning to accept USDT for purchases as access to foreign currency became more difficult.
In November 2025, the government announced plans to integrate cryptocurrencies and stablecoins into the financial system, including allowing banks to offer digital asset custody and crypto-linked financial products.
The government subsequently began considering a regulatory framework in July 2026 that would recognize USDT for payments, savings and trade alongside the boliviano and US dollar.
The proposal came as Bolivia struggled with a prolonged dollar shortage after abandoning its longstanding currency peg in June, fueling demand for dollar-denominated alternatives such as USDT, as Cointelegraph reported in July.
Magazine: Agents can trade 24/7 — but Yat Siu warns you could lose access at any time
Tether has led a pre-seed funding round in Bolivian fintech Peso, which offers USDT payments through food delivery apps and local banking networks, to support the company’s expansion across Latin America.
In a Wednesday announcement, Tether said the investment will help Peso expand its stablecoin payment infrastructure across Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina, including services that connect USDT with local currencies through banking and merchant payment systems.
Peso has integrated USDT payments into Yango’s food delivery service in Bolivia, allowing customers to pay for orders using the stablecoin. The fintech offers QR payments, point-of-sale services for merchants and virtual accounts linked to Bolivia’s banking system through ACH transfers. Tether did not disclose the size of its investment.
Source: Tether
The investment comes as other fintech companies expand USDT-based financial services in Bolivia. On Tuesday, lending platform Tala announced a partnership with El Dorado to offer credit directly through the digital wallet, allowing eligible customers to receive and repay loans in USDT on the Tempo blockchain.
Bolivia turns to stablecoins amid US dollar shortageBolivia has increasingly turned to stablecoins since 2025 amid a prolonged US dollar shortage and high inflation, with businesses beginning to accept USDT for purchases as access to foreign currency became more difficult.
In November 2025, the government announced plans to integrate cryptocurrencies and stablecoins into the financial system, including allowing banks to offer digital asset custody and crypto-linked financial products.
The government subsequently began considering a regulatory framework in July 2026 that would recognize USDT for payments, savings and trade alongside the boliviano and US dollar.
The proposal came as Bolivia struggled with a prolonged dollar shortage after abandoning its longstanding currency peg in June, fueling demand for dollar-denominated alternatives such as USDT, as Cointelegraph reported in July.
Magazine: Agents can trade 24/7 — but Yat Siu warns you could lose access at any time
Tether, the company behind the USDT stablecoin, has led a pre-seed funding round for Peso, a Bolivian fintech startup focused on expanding stablecoin payment solutions in Latin America. The investment aims to accelerate Peso’s integration of USDT payments into local financial ecosystems, making stablecoin transactions more accessible to consumers and businesses in the region.
Peso expands USDT payment options in BoliviaTether stated on Wednesday that its investment will support Peso’s efforts to grow its payment infrastructure across Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina. The company seeks to establish new connections between USDT and local currencies through traditional banking networks and merchant payment systems. The size of the investment was not disclosed by Tether.
Peso has already enabled USDT payments within Yango’s food delivery platform in Bolivia. Customers using this service can settle their orders directly in USDT, providing an alternative to local currency payments. The fintech has also rolled out QR payment options, point-of-sale systems for merchants, and virtual accounts integrated with Bolivia’s banking network via ACH transfer methods.
Peso is bringing stablecoin payments to everyday commerce in Bolivia, integrating USDT with local banking and merchant systems so consumers have more payment options.
Tether stated the investment would allow Peso to further enhance the reach of its stablecoin infrastructure while broadening payment, transfer, and merchant services throughout Latin America.
The entrance of Peso into Bolivia’s fintech scene follows similar moves by other companies leveraging USDT. On Tuesday, Tala, a lending platform, announced a collaboration with digital wallet provider El Dorado. This new partnership enables qualified customers in Bolivia to receive and repay loans directly in USDT, utilizing the Tempo blockchain for transactions.
Mini dictionary: Peso is a fintech startup based in Bolivia focusing on stablecoin payments and digital financial services in partnership with local banks and merchants.
Bolivia shifts to stablecoins as dollar shortages persistBolivia has turned to stablecoin adoption as a response to ongoing US dollar shortages and rising inflation that began in 2025. Businesses in the country have begun accepting USDT for purchases, providing alternatives as foreign currency became increasingly difficult to access.
In November 2025, the Bolivian government outlined initiatives to integrate cryptocurrencies and stablecoins into the national financial system. These plans included allowing banks to offer digital asset custody and crypto-linked financial products to retail and institutional clients.
By July 2026, authorities started working on a regulatory framework that would officially recognize USDT as an acceptable payment, savings, and trading option alongside the boliviano and the US dollar.
The shift followed Bolivia’s decision to abandon its long-instituted currency peg in June, deepening the dollar shortage and spurring greater demand for dollar-backed assets like USDT.
With local access to the US dollar under pressure, more Bolivian businesses are embracing stablecoin payments to manage trade and daily transactions.
This regulatory momentum suggests stablecoins may play an increasingly central role in Bolivia’s economic landscape, as both public and private actors respond to currency volatility and financial uncertainty.
Lightning Labs’ CTO warns of eMudhra Certificate Authority (CA) leakage risk, advises users to update relevant clients.
Lightning Labs CTO Olaoluwa Osuntokun published a post stating that due to the impact of the CVE-2026-111943 vulnerability, he strongly recommends all users of lnd, btcd, tapd, and litd either update their binary files or rebuild the software using Go 1.27.3. The CVE-2026-111943 flaw involves a compromised certificate authority, which may affect the security of the relevant software.
9 minutes ago
Glassnode: Bitcoin is in a strong range-bound state, with the market focusing on key catalyst events.
Glassnode released its weekly market report, stating that Bitcoin is constrained within a "trading range" of $80,000 to $87,000. Daily closes once rose above roughly $87,500, and recent ETF inflows paired with expanding trading volume show demand is absorbing supply at the upper end of the range. If Bitcoin breaks below $80,000, both ETF holders and average treasury investors will enter losses, potentially dragging the price down toward the True Market Mean. Below the range, buyers have re-accumulated positions near $80,000 based on ETF and Treasury cost bases (though at a smaller scale than the peak). Above the range, the cost basis for buyers who entered positions 6 to 12 months ago is around $86,700, paired with order book sell walls and liquidation clusters at roughly $85,000 and $87,000. A breakout from this range could accelerate, but will encounter selling pressure. Glassnode noted that investors should focus on upcoming key catalysts, including the Federal Reserve’s October 28 interest rate decision, rising oil prices and yields, and a rebound in inflation expectations. Separately, MSCI will publish its index adjustment list on November 11 (effective November 30), with potential removals of stocks such as Strategy, which could impact related equities and Bitcoin buying demand.
9 minutes ago
Bithumb will suspend XPLA deposits and withdrawals at 15:00 today to support network upgrades.
According to Bithumb's announcement, the platform will suspend XPLA token deposits and withdrawals on the XPLA network starting at 15:00 KST (Korea Standard Time) on October 22 to support network upgrades and node server updates. The node server update is scheduled for 19:00 the same day, though the exact time may be adjusted based on network conditions and block generation speed. Deposits and withdrawals will resume once network stability is confirmed, with a specific resumption time to be announced separately. XPLA trading will remain unaffected during this period.
9 minutes ago
Anthropic plans to publicly file its IPO documents as early as this Friday, with its current private market valuation standing at $1.957 trillion.
According to three people familiar with the matter, Anthropic plans to publicly file its S-1 investor prospectus as early as this Friday. The company confidentially submitted a draft to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in June. Per SEC regulations, companies that file confidentially must disclose relevant materials to the public at least 15 calendar days before the launch of their formal investor roadshow. The public filing will clear key procedural hurdles for a potential November initial public offering (IPO), though the final timing remains dependent on factors such as market conditions. Earlier reports noted some investors are targeting a $1.5 trillion valuation for Anthropic’s upcoming IPO, a 25% decrease from the earlier $2 trillion projection. Separately, data from trading platform Entropy shows Anthropic’s over-the-counter (OTC) contract market capitalization stands at $1.957 trillion.
9 minutes ago
Dragonfly Partner: The crypto industry is at the forefront of a global wave of cyberattacks.
Dragonfly Managing Partner Haseeb Qureshi has warned that the global cybersecurity landscape is facing a hacker wave comparable to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the crypto industry being the first to experience this trend. He argues that because on-chain attacks are the most straightforward way for hackers to generate direct profits, security breaches in crypto protocols can serve as an early warning sign of broader internet security risks. While the number of hacker attacks targeting the crypto sector has surged sharply, the annualized total value of stolen funds remains roughly on par with 2025 levels, indicating a decline in the average loss per attack. Qureshi pointed out that attackers are focusing on small DeFi protocols with weak security safeguards and inadequate maintenance, whereas large crypto protocols have begun leveraging AI tools to bolster their defenses. He predicts that this large-scale attack trend will eventually spread to the traditional internet industry.
9 minutes ago
Bloomberg: DeepSeek completes second-round financing of 100 billion yuan, with Tencent and CATL as the top investors.
Beating AI Express (Dongcha) reports: Bloomberg’s latest report states that DeepSeek has completed its second round of financing worth 100 billion yuan, with Tencent and CATL being among the largest investors. The round was initially targeted to raise 50 billion yuan, but its fundraising goal was raised twice afterward. Despite the financing scale doubling, DeepSeek’s pre-money valuation remains at around 500 billion yuan. At the end of June this year, DeepSeek just closed its first round of financing of approximately 51 billion yuan, with founder Liang Wenfeng contributing around 20 billion yuan personally. Calculated based on the reported scale of this round, the total financing of the two rounds amounts to roughly 150 billion yuan. In this round, new and existing shareholders will each contribute about half of the total planned investment. CATL will add around 10 billion yuan, while Tencent will also continue to invest approximately 10 billion yuan. New investors include Stone Capital, SMIC Holdings, CPE Source Capital, Legend Capital, and Geely, among others. Perfect World announced on October 22 that two funds managed by entities related to Lisi Capital and Shixiang Capital have completed fundraising, with sizes of 7.52 billion yuan and 3.65 billion yuan respectively. Perfect World has subscribed to a total of 150 million yuan, and Century Huatong has previously disclosed its participation in the investment. Both funds participated in DeepSeek’s current financing round, but the specific investment amounts have not been made public. DeepSeek is also preparing for an IPO on China’s STAR Market, planning to submit its listing application as early as the end of this year and aiming to go public in 2027.
Tether has led a $15 million Series A funding round for New York-based Mural, supporting the financial technology company’s development of payment infrastructure for businesses and artificial intelligence agents.
Summary
Tether led Mural’s $15 million Series A, bringing the New York startup’s total funding to $28 million.
North Island Ventures and existing investors participated, with proceeds allocated to payment infrastructure and international expansion.
Mural has processed $2.1 billion in payments across 128 countries since launching its API in 2025.
The platform connects traditional banking, stablecoins and compliance tools to support payments authorized for AI agents.
Tether recently backed AIsa and Tenstorrent as part of its investments in AI technology.
According to Mural’s October 20 announcement, North Island Ventures and existing investors participated in the financing, bringing its total capital raised to $28 million.
Tether backs Mural as total funding reaches $28 million
Mural plans to use the investment to expand internationally and develop the banking, payment and compliance services needed for software agents to conduct financial transactions.
Founded in 2022 by former Palantir engineers Sinclair Toffa and Chris Fernandes, the company provides infrastructure that businesses use to manage accounts, payment instructions, identity verification and regulatory requirements across banking networks and blockchains.
Its customers include global payroll provider Deel, browser developer Opera and financial technology platform Axexo. Through Mural’s system, businesses can offer accounts holding dollars, local currencies and stablecoins without managing separate financial infrastructure for each payment method.
The company reported processing $2.1 billion in payments for users across 128 countries since introducing its application programming interface in 2025. Payment volume recorded so far in 2026 is nearly six times its total for 2025.
Mural has not disclosed the valuation attached to the latest funding round. Fortune reported that the company previously raised $5 million in seed financing in 2022, followed by additional capital from existing backers.
The financing gives Mural fresh capital to develop services for AI software capable of initiating transactions under instructions established by businesses.
“The economy is about to gain 10 billion new participants, and none of them are human,” Mural CEO Sinclair Toffa said in the announcement.
Toffa described the company’s next stage as extending financial infrastructure beyond businesses and individuals to autonomous software operating on their behalf.
Mural develops payment controls for AI agents
Mural’s infrastructure allows companies to determine how software agents access accounts and execute transactions.
Its account management system includes spending limits, approved counterparties and additional authorization requirements for payments exceeding established thresholds.
For businesses deploying AI agents, the controls determine which transactions automated systems can initiate and which payments require further approval.
The arrangement is designed to work across banking services, payment networks and blockchain systems, giving businesses a consolidated record of financial activity.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino identified Mural’s experience connecting enterprise software with stablecoin payment services as a major consideration behind the investment.
“As agents start moving money, that connection to the banks, payment networks and compliance systems the world still runs on becomes essential,” Ardoino said.
Mural’s founders developed their approach while working at Palantir, where they helped large companies connect software systems performing different functions.
The company now applies a similar model to financial services, with engineers working directly alongside customers to establish integrations across individual markets.
Olek Shtanoprud, Deel’s head of payments, credited the startup’s engineers for their understanding of local payment conditions and their work alongside the payroll company’s team in Colombia.
Mural Technologies is not itself a bank. Its payment services are provided through Mural Networks, a FinCEN-registered money services business, and federally chartered U.S. banking partners where applicable.
Tether expands investments in AI payment infrastructure
The Mural financing follows several investments by Tether in companies developing automated payments, artificial intelligence and financial infrastructure.
On October 15, Tether Capital announced an investment in AIsa, which provides AI agents with access to paid software, data and computing services.
As crypto.news previously reported, AIsa’s financing brought its total funding above $9 million, with Tether and HIVEN joining existing investors including Alibaba and Tribe Capital.
AIsa focuses on enabling automated purchases of digital services, while Mural provides the underlying accounts, permissions and payment infrastructure used by fintech companies.
The investments were announced separately, and neither company has disclosed an integration between the two platforms.
On October 20, Tether Capital joined Tenstorrent’s financing, participating in the AI computing company’s $1.5 billion Series E at a $6.2 billion valuation.
Tenstorrent develops processors, computing systems and software for artificial intelligence workloads. Tether did not disclose its individual contribution or ownership stake in the financing.
The stablecoin issuer has therefore backed companies operating in different parts of the AI industry, including payment services, autonomous software and computing infrastructure.
Mural, meanwhile, recently changed its name from Mural Pay. In an October 14 company statement, Toffa said its existing team, licenses and compliance arrangements would remain unchanged following the rebrand.
Tether Invests in Peso to Expand USD₮ Payment Infrastructure Across Latin America
21 October 2026 – Tether, the largest company in the digital asset industry, led the pre-seed round in Peso, a Bolivian fintech company that provides access to payments, savings, and investments across Latin America. The investment aims to help Peso expand access to fast, low-cost, stablecoin-powered payments in the region while accelerating the use of USD₮ in everyday transactions across retail, institutions, e-commerce, food delivery, ride-hailing, and banking rails.
Peso provides a global USD₮ account that lets users save, spend, invest, and send money across borders from a single app. The company also brings USD₮ payments into the digital services people use every day, starting with Yango, a digital services platform operating in Bolivia, where users can now order food and pay in USD₮ directly in the app. In addition, Peso offers point-of-sale acceptance and virtual accounts in the user’s own name that connect USD₮ directly to the full Bolivian banking system via QR and ACH rails, enabling users to move seamlessly between stablecoins and local fiat.
The investment aligns with Tether’s broader mission to bridge the gap between traditional finance and digital assets by supporting platforms that address real-world financial challenges with stable, liquid, blockchain-powered payment solutions. In doing so, Tether aims to advance the global use of stablecoins and make them more practical and accessible.
The funding will support Peso’s expansion of local on- and off-ramps across its active markets in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina, deepening USD₮’s role as the settlement layer connecting local currencies. It will also accelerate Peso’s broader product roadmap, including its merchant-facing point-of-sale network and virtual account infrastructure, delivering more transparent and accessible financial services to users and merchants across the region.
“Peso is building the kind of everyday-spend infrastructure that turns USD₮ from a savings tool into a payments channel people rely on daily. This aligns with our goal to promote financial inclusion and ensure access to faster, easier, and more interoperable financial services,” said Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether. “By supporting Peso’s growth across the region, we aim to create a new standard for stablecoin-powered solutions.”
“Latin Americans are already using USD₮; what was missing was the infrastructure to spend it in everyday life without friction. This investment lets us accelerate what we have been building: making it possible for anyone in the region to open an account in minutes and use USD₮ daily, from paying by QR code to sending money across borders. That a company like Tether chose a Bolivian startup for this investment is a recognition of the talent and execution capacity that exists here, and we are proud to have them as collaborators at this stage,” said Alejandro Terán, CEO and Co-Founder of Peso.
Not financial or tax advice. PANews content is strictly educational and informational and is not investment advice, financial advice, tax advice, legal advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any digital asset, security, or financial product. Do your own research and consult qualified advisers.
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A series of security vulnerabilities have been disclosed in internet infrastructure software within a single day, affecting PHP, Node.js, and Go.
Multiple internet infrastructure software projects rolled out security updates in a single day, addressing vulnerabilities including remote code execution, TLS certificate validation bypass, and certificate trust risks. PHP fixed two critical flaws: CVE-2026-109618 and CVE-2026-109619, both enabling unauthenticated remote code execution that impacts PHP environments processing web requests. The patched versions are 8.5.12, 8.4.27, 8.3.36, and 8.2.35. Node.js’ advisory details 10 vulnerabilities, four of which are high-severity: these include remote code execution via out-of-bounds write in the Brotli decoder, DNS name truncation, and two TLS certificate hostname validation bypass issues. Fixed versions are 26.12.1, 24.22.1, and 22.23.4. Additionally, Go’s crypto/x509-related risk is tracked as CVE-2026-111943, rated "Important" by Red Hat with a CVSS 3.1 score of 6.8. Attackers with specific network access and valid certificates could impersonate legitimate servers to intercept or alter communications. Go 1.26.10 and 1.27.3 have been added to a deny list, blocking trust for compromised intermediate certificates.
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Dataline completes $10.6 million seed round funding, and plans to conduct an ICO.
Decentralized data network for AI agents Dataline has closed a $10.6 million seed round, co-led by Lattice and Samsung-backed Dispersion Capital, with participation from Symbolic Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Anagram, and Robinhood co-founder & CEO Vlad Tenev, among others. The round, completed in April, utilized a SAFE agreement with token warrants; valuation was not disclosed. Dataline is now live, covering approximately 50 data sources to deliver on-chain and off-chain data, and scores data reliability, timeliness, and consistency using AI. Proceeds will be allocated to expanding data sources, enhancing data validation, and expanding into robotics, AI training data, and other sectors. Dataline plans to launch a token by the end of 2026 for network payments and data access, and intends to conduct a public token sale on Base via Uniswap’s Continuous Clearing Auction (CCA) system, with details set to be revealed next week. The public sale’s target fundraising amount, token quantity, and other terms remain undisclosed.
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Trump plans to leverage White House cyber crime efforts to showcase achievements in combating cross-border crypto fraud.
White House officials said on October 21 that Trump planned to focus on the U.S. government’s actions to crack down on overseas crypto fraud rings during the White House’s cybersecurity event that day, including recovering funds and shutting down fraudulent operations. These transnational criminal groups steal funds from U.S. citizens via romance scams, phishing, ransomware and other methods. The U.S. government noted that law enforcement agencies have seized approximately $833 million in crypto assets linked to overseas fraud, and shut down 503 fraudulent crypto websites under the supervision of the Homeland Security Task Force. Relevant authorities have also notified nearly 9,000 U.S. citizens to alert them they are being targeted by fraud. The U.S. Treasury Department previously announced the establishment of an inter-agency "Fraud Strike Task Force" to target "pig butchering" scams run by organized criminal groups in Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and the Philippines. Since last year, the U.S. has also imposed multiple sanctions aimed at cutting off support for related fraud websites and their infrastructure.
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American Bankers Association voices dissatisfaction with OCC’s final GENIUS Act rule, which abandons proposed restrictions on stablecoin yields.
Crypto journalist Eleanor Terrett reported that the American Bankers Association (ABA) has voiced dissatisfaction with the final rules implemented by the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) under the GENIUS Act. The OCC abandoned the previously proposed restrictions on stablecoin yields, a move the ABA argues will "maintain the status quo for crypto platforms." The ABA’s CEO stated: "It is a mistake to wait until deposit outflows and economic harm have already occurred before attempting to address these issues."
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Beyond PHP, three Node.js version branches are also affected by high-severity vulnerabilities, and users need to update their runtime environments promptly.
Node.js rolled out a security update on October 21, covering its 26.x, 24.x, and 22.x version branches, with corresponding patched releases: 26.12.1, 24.22.1, and 22.23.4. The advisory details 10 total vulnerabilities, categorized as 4 critical-severity, 3 medium-severity, and 3 low-severity, with varying impact scopes across the three version lines. The critical CVE-2026-111497 is an out-of-bounds write flaw in the Brotli decoder that could enable remote code execution (RCE), affecting all three branches. Other critical issues include improper null character handling in DNS resolution and a TLS certificate hostname validation bypass. The update also resolves problems with persistent connection response processing, random number cache duplication, and permission models, while updating dependencies including c-ares, OpenSSL, and Undici. The official note warns that end-of-life (EOL) versions may still be vulnerable, advising users to use the latest supported releases. Separately, prior reports noted PHP has fixed two critical unauthenticated RCE vulnerabilities, with patches available for versions 8.5.12, 8.4.27, 8.3.36, and 8.2.35; PHP users are urged to upgrade immediately.
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Bonk Guy: This round is the "privacy cycle", privacy protocol MASK is undervalued.
Renowned trader Bonk Guy posted that the current crypto market is showing characteristics of a "privacy cycle". He noted that since yesterday, Bitcoin has risen approximately 3%, ZEC is up 16%, adding over $3 billion in market capitalization. MASK currently has a market cap of roughly $26 million, with its protocol trading volume and fees hitting consecutive all-time highs, he added. Citing data from DefiLlama, he stated that MASK ranks first among privacy protocols by revenue, outearning the next 10 privacy protocols combined. By comparison, ZEC’s market cap gain over the past 24 hours is roughly 115 times MASK’s entire market cap. Bonk Guy also said that MASK’s upcoming deployment on Solana is set to launch in the coming days, which he expects will further drive growth in usage, trading volume, and fees. He went on to call MASK the most undervalued privacy protocol in the crypto market.
Tether has led a pre-seed funding round in Peso, a Bolivian fintech startup building payment infrastructure around USD₮ across Latin America.
The size of the check was not disclosed. The investment was announced on October 21, 2026. It lands as Peso begins stepping outside its home market of Bolivia and into three of the region’s larger economies: Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina.
What Peso actually does Users get app-based USD₮ accounts that handle saving, spending, investing, and sending money across borders.
In Bolivia, Peso links into the domestic banking system through QR codes and ACH networks, letting users shift funds between stablecoins and local bank balances.
Peso has also integrated USD₮ payments into Yango, a digital services platform operating in Bolivia. That means users can pay for food delivery and other services in the stablecoin.
What the executives are saying Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino framed the deal as an attempt to set a “new standard” for stablecoin solutions.
Peso CEO Alejandro Terán said the investment shines a light on Bolivian talent and is aimed at making it smoother for people to spend USD₮.
Part of a broader Latin America push In September 2026, Tether backed Plenti with a $3M seed investment. Back in July 2026, it put $20M into Ualá.
The Peso round is the smallest-stage bet of the group so far. Pre-seed is about as early as venture investing gets.
Why Latin America keeps coming up Stablecoins tend to find their warmest reception in places where people have reason to distrust their local currency. Peso’s model addresses that access problem directly by wrapping USD₮ inside a familiar banking-style experience and linking it to local payment systems.
What this means For Peso, the backing brings resources, but the expansion is where the real test begins. Integrating with Bolivia’s banking system is one achievement; replicating that across Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina means dealing with different payment rails, different regulators, and different competitors in each market.
Governments that worry about losing control over their monetary systems may not welcome widespread use of a privately issued dollar token. How regulators in Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina respond to apps like Peso will shape how far this model can scale.
The metrics worth watching are not the funding headlines. They are the usage figures: how many people hold USD₮ in Peso accounts, how often they spend it, and whether integrations like Yango expand into other merchants and services.
Disclosure: This article was edited by John Chen. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
On January 18, 2027, every firm that wants to put a dollar-pegged stablecoin in front of American users will answer to a single federal rulebook for the first time. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency published that rulebook on Tuesday, October 21, 2026, in a final rule that locks in reserve, redemption, capital, and risk-management standards for payment stablecoin issuers — while the industry’s loudest fight, over whether issuers may keep paying yield or rewards, stays a case-by-case question the agency declined to settle in one stroke.
The final rule and its three companion bulletins take effect the same day as the GENIUS Act itself, January 18, 2027. The stakes are written in the market’s own numbers: Tether’s USDT carried a $182.8 billion market capitalization on October 21, and Circle’s USDC another $72.1 billion, according to CoinGecko data — more than $254 billion in dollar substitutes that, from that date forward, must sit inside the framework the OCC just finished. Put against a total cryptocurrency market value of roughly $2.88 trillion, the two largest dollar stablecoins alone are about 8.9 percent of the entire asset class.
Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent framed the moment in historic terms. “The GENIUS Act marks a watershed moment in American finance, further cementing the United States as the crypto capital of the world. Just as President Abraham Lincoln’s National Currency Act of 1863 established a national framework for bank-issued currency, the GENIUS Act establishes a federal framework for payment stablecoins in the digital age,” Bessent said in the agency’s release.
Eighteen Months From Bill to Binding Rule The rule did not arrive quickly. The GENIUS Act was enacted on July 18, 2025, and its implementing framework has been under construction ever since. The OCC published its notice of proposed rulemaking on March 2, 2026, closed the formal comment window on May 1, and kept accepting late comments through July 1. By the time the final rule landed, roughly 328 comments had stacked up from crypto firms, trade groups, banks, academics, and individuals — a signal of how much the industry had riding on the details.
The gap between enactment and effective date spans 18 months, but the sharper arithmetic sits in the tail. The OCC finalized its rule 233 days after proposing it, and issuers now have exactly 89 days from publication to bring operations into line before the framework becomes binding. That compressed runway is the piece that will occupy compliance teams between now and January.
For readers new to the statute, what the GENIUS Act actually requires is a three-category licensing system: bank subsidiaries, federally qualified nonbank issuers, and state-qualified issuers under a $10 billion ceiling. The OCC’s part of that architecture is now finished, apart from the anti-money-laundering chapter still sitting in a separate rulemaking.
The provision that drew the most heat never left the statute: a payment stablecoin issuer may not pay “interest or yield to a payment stablecoin holder solely in connection with the holding, use, or retention of such payment stablecoin.” The proposal tried to police evasion with a rebuttable presumption that certain affiliate and third-party payments violated the ban. Commenters tore at it from both directions.
Some wanted the presumption broadened, or argued that a presumption was inadequate and that certain indirect payments should be conclusively banned. Others pushed to narrow or delete it entirely, warning that a presumption this wide could sweep in ordinary payments to related third parties that had nothing to do with rewarding holders for simply sitting on a token. This is not a theoretical squabble — it is the difference between Coinbase, PayPal, or Kraken being able to keep marketing a rewards rate on a stablecoin balance and having to redesign the product outright.
The OCC’s release does not hand down a blanket answer on existing rewards programs. The rule keeps the statutory ban intact and leaves the application of it to be assessed on the facts of each arrangement, with the agency free to update the regulations as issuer business models evolve. For the firms that spent the past two years building rewards features around stablecoin holdings, that is the closest thing to a live question this “final” rule could have produced.
Reserves, Redemption, and the Run the OCC Was Warned About Away from the yield fight, the final rule’s edits read as a deliberate loosening. The OCC made reserve asset management more flexible than proposed while keeping core liquidity, diversification, and concentration requirements so issuers “remain sufficiently reserved and capable of meeting redemption requests in a timely manner.” Capital and operational backstop requirements are more detailed than the proposal but simplified, and risk-management standards under new §15.13 scale with the nature, scope, and risk of an issuer’s activities rather than applying one block to everyone. The final rule also accommodates special purpose vehicle issuers structured to protect the rights of payment stablecoin holders.
Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan V. Gould put the emphasis on the practical floor the rule builds. “We are providing a clear, practical framework for payment stablecoin innovation, with strong standards for reserve backing, redemption, and risk management,” Gould said.
But the comment record carried a warning the agency itself summarized: several commenters argued against any freeze or extension of redemption during a spike in withdrawal requests, on the ground that such provisions could accelerate a run. That is the paradox at the center of stablecoin regulation — the tools meant to slow a panic can themselves be read as a signal that redemptions might not be honored. The final rule’s treatment of redemption timing, down to a definition of “business day” that excludes weekends and federal holidays, shows the OCC working through exactly that tension.
What Still Has No Final Answer For a document titled “final,” the OCC left a striking amount of runway. The Bank Secrecy Act, anti-money-laundering, and sanctions chapters are being written in a separate rulemaking, and the agency will announce separately when it begins accepting applications and waiver requests from prospective issuers. The final rule also narrows the definition of “customer” to direct counterparties of the issuer, so a holder who bought a stablecoin through a third-party distributor is not a customer of the issuer until they redeem directly — a change that quietly redraws who is owed what protections.
The honest read is that January 18, 2027 is the beginning of compliance, not the end of the argument. The Treasury’s own comment window on its parallel Section 3 proposal closed on October 19 with the industry still litigating the same questions the OCC just heard. What to watch is concrete: the separate BSA/AML final rule, the OCC’s application-processing announcement, and the first public moves by Tether, Circle, and the exchanges to explain whether their existing yield and rewards features survive contact with the new text.
Disclosure: This article does not represent investment advice. The content and materials featured on this page are for educational purposes only.
Tether led a $15 million Series A funding round for Mural, bringing the financial infrastructure company’s total funding to $28 million.Founded by former Palantir engineers, Mural helps companies manage payments, accounts, identity verification and regulatory compliance across banking networks and blockchains.The investment advances Tether’s push into agentic finance as companies develop safeguards that allow AI systems to execute transactions on behalf of people and businesses.Tether led a $15 million funding round in Mural, expanding the stablecoin issuer’s investments in technology that enables AI agents to handle payments.
The Series A round, which included participation from North Island Ventures and existing investors, brings New York-based Mural's total funding to $28 million, according to an emailed announcement on Tuesday.
Mural, founded by former Palantir (PLTR) engineers, provides fintechs and other platforms with infrastructure for managing accounts, payments, identity verification and regulatory compliance across traditional banking networks and blockchains. Its customers include payroll platform Deel and browser developer Opera.
The funding comes as financial technology companies explore “agentic finance,” in which AI systems can initiate and execute transactions on behalf of individuals or businesses.
Mural's infrastructure allows companies to set transaction limits, restrict counterparties and require additional approvals for larger payments, addressing questions around authorization and accountability when autonomous software moves money.
“As agents start moving money, that connection to the banks, payment networks and compliance systems the world still runs on becomes essential,” Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said in the statement.
The investment reflects Tether's growing interest in infrastructure beyond stablecoin issuance, particularly as programmable payments emerge as a potential use case for AI-powered financial services.
AI Disclaimer: Parts of this article were generated with the assistance from AI tools and reviewed by our editorial team to ensure accuracy and adherence to our standards. For more information, see CoinDesk's full AI Policy.
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Cross-border payments startup Mural, founded in 2022 by former Palantir engineers Sinclair Toffa and Chris Fernandes, has announced the completion of a $15 million Series A funding round led by Tether, with participation from North Island Ventures. Following this financing, Mural’s total funding stands at $28 million, while its specific valuation remains undisclosed. Mural provides enterprises with a unified payment management platform that supports managing U.S. dollars, local currencies, and stablecoins in a single account, helping payroll providers, software companies, and fintech firms integrate banks, payment service providers, and cross-border settlement channels. The company plans to use the proceeds from this round to further develop its platform. Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino stated that the investment also targets the financial service needs of AI agents. As AI agents gradually participate in financial activities, they require payment systems that operate 24/7 and cover global markets. According to an Alvarez & Marsal report, stablecoin payments totaled approximately $400 billion in the first eight months of 2026. Chainalysis data shows that between July 2025 and June 2026, stablecoin cross-border fund flows reached $220 billion, a nearly 78% year-on-year increase.
Tether has joined Tenstorrent’s $1.5 billion Series E funding round at a $6.2 billion valuation, adding an AI hardware investment to its work on software and automated payments.
Summary
Tether joined Tenstorrent’s $1.5 billion funding round at a $6.2 billion valuation. Tenstorrent plans to fund Galaxy server production, chip development and global expansion. Neither company disclosed Tether’s investment amount or ownership stake. Tether’s other recent AI projects include AIsa payments and offline speech recognition. Tether Capital announced its participation on Oct. 20, just a day after Tenstorrent disclosed it had completed its financing round. Neither company said how much Tether invested, how much of Tenstorrent it owns, or how it will record the investment in its accounts.
In its announcement, Tether described its El Salvador-based investment arm as a business that deploys company profits and excess reserves. It did not identify which funds paid for the Tenstorrent stake or place the investment within a specific balance-sheet category.
Tether joins a completed Tenstorrent equity round In its Oct. 19 statement, Tenstorrent identifies Trace Capital and Innovation X as the round’s leaders. Its investor list names Tether Investments, while Tether’s own announcement uses Tether Capital.
Among the other participants, the chipmaker named are ARK Invest, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Morgan Stanley, Sandisk, T. Rowe Price, Eclipse and XTX Markets. The firm describes the transaction as an equity raise and gives the $6.2 billion figure as its post-money valuation.
Reuters reported the completed financing round on Oct. 19 and said the company’s previous round raised more than $693 million in December 2024 at a $2 billion pre-money valuation.
Led by Jim Keller, Tenstorrent plans to spend the proceeds on deploying Galaxy servers, developing AI and CPU designs, and expanding commercial operations. Its announcement noted the servers support open-weight language models and video generation.
Among the products the company sells are equipment ranging from individual cards and workstations to racks and superclusters. Chip designers can also license its TT-Ascalon CPU technology and Tensix AI cores, with Samsung and LG among the customers named in its release.
Ardoino backs locally controlled AI computing Explaining the investment, Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said AI should be something people can “build, run and control themselves”
It ties the investment to Tether’s preference for AI systems that developers and businesses can operate independently. Tether says reliance on proprietary hardware and cloud providers limits users’ choices over where their systems run.
Meanwhile, Tenstorrent describes its software stack as open source and says customers can run models locally or deploy them within their own facilities. Its funding announcement did not provide an independent comparison of the cost of these deployments against competing services.
Keller described the company’s product approach in the financing announcement:
“We built one architecture and sell it at every size.”
Keller previously led Tesla’s work on a self-driving chip and held chip-design roles at Apple and AMD. Tenstorrent is based in Santa Clara, California.
Tether’s disclosed reserve figures predate the investment crypto.news previously reported that Tether disclosed $1.5 billion in profit from Q2 operations, with U.S. Treasury investments and repo operations supporting its earnings.
In its July 31 release, the issuer reported assets of $187.75 billion against liabilities of $183.64 billion as of June 30. Its stated excess reserve buffer was $4.11 billion, and it said most reserves remained in U.S. government-backed instruments and short-term liquidity facilities.
It also revealed reducing secured lending exposure by $2.38 billion during the quarter and adding 14 tons of physical gold. Its reported gold holdings exceeded 146 tons.
On Aug. 13, Tether announced an unqualified KPMG audit opinion covering its 2025 financial statements. According to the company, the audited accounts showed reserves exceeding liabilities by $6.814 billion at Dec. 31, 2025.
Tether said the audit examined transactions, ownership records, valuations, counterparties, and supporting documents. The annual accounts cover a period before the Tenstorrent financing, while the June reserve figures describe a separate reporting date.
AI spending includes agent payments and speech software Before the chip investment, Tether and HIVEN joined a seed extension for AIsa, whose Oct. 15 announcement placed cumulative funding above $9 million.
AIsa says its platform lets enterprise AI agents obtain paid data, models, software and other services through one interface. Its controls include permissions, budgets, spending limits, approval steps and transaction records.
The firm says it has started enterprise pilots covering financial intelligence, market research, supply-chain management and commerce. Neither participant’s individual investment was disclosed in the announcements.
Tether’s recent software releases include an offline speech recognition model, QVAC TranscribePsy, announced on Oct. 14. The 254-million-parameter software processes audio on devices without uploading recordings to cloud servers.
In company evaluations, TranscribePsy recorded a 6.58% word error rate on Multilingual LibriSpeech and 21.56% on Common Voice.
The release includes mobile and laptop configurations, with versions built for Apple’s Neural Engine and the parakeet.cpp engine. Tether published model weights and evaluation configurations, and identified smart glasses and humanoid robots among the intended applications.
Tether, the company behind the world’s most widely used stablecoin, has put money into AI chip developer Tenstorrent. The stated goal is to increase access to AI computing infrastructure.
The investment came through Tether Capital, the firm’s investment branch. It landed as part of a much larger financing event, and the numbers attached to that event are hard to ignore.
A $1.5 billion round at a $6.2 billion valuation On October 19, 2026, Tenstorrent announced it had completed a $1.5 billion Series E funding round. The deal set the company’s post-money valuation at $6.2 billion.
The jump is steep. Tenstorrent’s Series D in December 2024 valued the company at $2 billion, so the new figure more than doubles it.
Trace Capital and Innovation X led the raise. A long list of other financial firms joined, including ARK Invest and Fidelity Management, with Tether Capital among the notable participants.
What the money is for Tenstorrent plans to use the capital in three main ways. It will scale production of its Galaxy servers, push forward on AI and CPU technology development, and expand its commercial operations globally.
The Galaxy servers are the headline product. Each one packs dozens of Tenstorrent’s AI chips into a single system.
Tenstorrent already counts major clients such as Samsung and LG among its users.
Why Tether is buying in The investment fits a broader push at Tether toward decentralizing AI computing power. The idea is to reduce dependence on the handful of major cloud providers that currently control much of the world’s AI capacity.
What this means for the AI and crypto crossover The most direct read is that Tether is becoming an active capital allocator in technology well beyond payments. A stake in a fast-growing AI hardware company is a bet on infrastructure, not on tokens.
For Tenstorrent, the cap table tells its own story. Pairing long-standing asset managers like Fidelity with growth-focused investors like ARK Invest, and adding a crypto-native backer on top, gives the company a wide mix of capital sources.
What to watch next: how quickly Tenstorrent scales Galaxy server output, whether new enterprise customers join Samsung and LG, and whether Tether Capital continues adding AI infrastructure names to its portfolio.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Diego Almada Lopez. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Tether’s USDT shed nearly $1 billion in market capitalization over five days in mid-October 2026, a contraction that is putting pressure on Bitcoin’s recovery at a delicate moment.
The numbers behind the contraction On-chain analytics firm CryptoQuant tracked the $1 billion decline as Bitcoin was attempting to rebuild upward momentum. The broader picture, drawn from data compiled by Crystal Intelligence, is harder to ignore.
USDT balances held across 19 major exchanges and lending platforms fell by $4.6 billion between early July and October 1, 2026. Over that same period, those platforms absorbed approximately $1.9 billion in competing stablecoins, primarily USDC and RLUSD, suggesting traders did not exit the market entirely but did rotate away from Tether specifically.
Bybit illustrated that rotation most sharply. The exchange shed $1.66 billion in USDT while simultaneously adding $315 million in RLUSD, making it the single platform with the largest net USDT outflow in the dataset.
Overall USDT supply declined about 0.4%, or approximately $647 million, through September 2026, leaving the total near $184 billion. By October 20, that figure had slipped further to around $183 billion.
Why stablecoin supply and Bitcoin price are connected The 2024 and 2025 Bitcoin rallies coincided with repeated multi-billion-dollar expansions in USDT’s market cap. Each wave of new issuance effectively refueled demand at a systemic level, giving traders and institutions the dry powder to push prices higher.
The $1.9 billion that flowed into USDC and RLUSD during the same period that USDT lost $4.6 billion at exchanges is a gap, not a replacement. Competing stablecoins are growing, but they are not yet moving in volumes large enough to make the overall liquidity picture neutral.
What traders and investors should watch First, watch net USDT issuance. Tether mints and redeems USDT based on client demand. A return to net minting, especially in large tranches, would indicate that institutional and retail demand for stablecoin liquidity is recovering.
Second, monitor the USDC and RLUSD inflows at major exchanges. If competing stablecoins continue gaining ground, the question becomes whether their combined growth can offset USDT’s retreat and keep overall liquidity conditions stable for Bitcoin trading pairs.
Third, keep an eye on Bybit’s balance sheet in particular. As the platform with the largest single USDT outflow in this dataset, its trajectory will serve as a leading indicator for whether exchange-level stablecoin rotation is accelerating or stabilizing.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Vivian Nguyen. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino has challenged a Senate staff report criticizing the company’s handling of Iran-linked wallets. In a post, he claimed Tether’s actions caused related stablecoin transaction volumes to fall 94%.
The dispute is about whether the USDT issuer stopped sanctioned networks from moving funds on time. Ardoino claims there were early freezes, but Senate investigators are saying there were cases where money continued flowing before Tether blocked the addresses.
Ardoino says Tether acted before sanctions
According to Ardoino, since 2023, Tether has frozen the addresses concerned at least four weeks before formal designations by U.S. and Israeli sanctions authorities.
He also claimed the company acted before blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis labeled the reported addresses 99% of the time.
Source: X
Senate investigators highlight delayed freezes
The September 28 report came from Democratic staff of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, led by ranking member Richard Blumenthal.
Investigators looked at 846 wallets that were sanctioned or targeted to be seized because of associations with Iran and its regional proxies. They found that 84% of these addresses transacted only in USDT, or almost entirely in USDT.
The report also described 39 addresses linked by Israeli authorities to a Hezbollah financier in June 2023. According to investigators, Tether froze five but waited until March 2024 before it blocked the remaining 34.
More than $34.6 million in USDT left those wallets after the seizure notice became public, the report said. Investigators acknowledged some responses to sanctions but characterized Tether’s efforts as inconsistent.
Tether points to $550 million in frozen funds
In its September 28 response, Tether said it was part of about $550 million in Iran-linked USDT freezes in 2026.
The company highlighted more than $344 million frozen across two addresses in April and over $130 million across four wallets in July. It said the April action preceded the addresses’ formal addition to U.S. sanctions listings by one day.
Final Summary
Ardoino claims Tether’s actions reduced Iran-linked stablecoin volumes by 94%.
Senate investigators pointed out freezees that did not happen fast enough, but Tether points to about $550 million it blocked in 2026.
Three wallets tied to a brokerage took in $575 million in USDT in spring 2025, and the Senate report says Tether did not freeze any of them.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino pushed back on X against a US Senate subcommittee report, dated September 28, that accuses the stablecoin issuer of being slow to freeze wallets tied to Iran and its proxies.
At issue is whether Tether freezes addresses ahead of sanctions designations, as the executive claims, or behind them, as the report contends.
Tether Says It Freezes Early, While the Report Finds Delays Ardoino put the word “analysis” in quotation marks when describing Senator Richard Blumenthal’s work. Since 2023, he wrote, Tether has frozen reported addresses an average of four weeks before formal designations by the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and Israel’s National Bureau for Counter Terror Financing (NBCTF), and in 99% of cases it did so before blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis labeled them.
The Tether chief also credited the company’s actions with a 94% decline in Iran-linked stablecoin volumes, which he attributed to “law enforcement partnerships.”
Titled “Tethered to Terrorism,” the report comes from Blumenthal and the minority staff of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. It analyzed 846 wallets that OFAC or the NBCTF sanctioned or targeted for seizure and found that 84% transacted exclusively, or nearly exclusively, in USDT.
Delays are the subject of the report’s third finding. After the NBCTF designated 39 wallets linked to a Hezbollah money launderer in June 2023, Tether froze only five of them for months and blocked the other 34 in March 2024, shortly before OFAC sanctioned the same launderer.
The subcommittee’s analysis showed that more than $34.6 million in USDT left those wallets after the seizure notice was published. Babak Zanjani, a sanctioned Iranian money launderer, posted Central Bank of Iran wallet addresses on X in December 2025, and Tether had not blacklisted them as of September, according to the report.
You may also like: Bitcoin Under Pressure as Trump Reportedly Prepares to Strike Iran Within 24 Hours Tether Signs MoU With Kazakhstan’s Central Bank to Explore a Tenge Stablecoin Is Bitcoin’s $85K Consolidation the Calm Before the Storm Amid Rising Middle East Tensions? Three wallets tied to the Modex Exchange Company, a brokerage the report links to funding Iran’s central bank, took in $575 million in USDT between April and June 2025, and Tether did not blacklist those either.
Nearly $5B Frozen As CryptoPotato reported earlier, Tether said on September 28 that it had helped US authorities freeze nearly $550 million in Iran-linked USDT this year, including more than $344 million across two addresses tied to the Central Bank of Iran in April.
The company also reported freezing more than $22 million across over 40 cases referred by Israel’s counter-terror financing bureau, and across all cases, the stablecoin issuer says it had helped freeze more than $4.9 billion, including over $2.4 billion connected to US authorities.
