Stablecoins and Blacklists

[wiggi]

Until today I thought that, because Tether had to ask Omni for a hardfork to quarantine stolen USDT after the hack on November 19, 2017, freezing funds would require another Omni hardfork to freeze other addresses, and small fish would be safe here. However they lied in their press release

Note that this software will cause a consensus change to currently running Omni Core clients, meaning that it is effectively a temporary hard fork to the Omni Layer. Integrators running this build will not accept any token sends from the attacker’s address, preventing the coins from moving further from the attacker’s address.

What they actually did was permanently corrupting Omni that was decentralized before.

Code:

https://github.com/OmniLayer/omnicore/commits/master?before=1c0ae8ae01ed79ae3715a16124e8acb98cb67800+4725&branch=master

Conspiracy theory, Tether hacked themselves on purpose so they can lick authority boots and have better compliance.

Any ETH smartcontract may include a token blocking function and any funds may be blocked.

Probably true for any shady crypto even if not a smartcontract.

[zasad@]

Tether freezes $150 million in USDT
https://shibastore.co/tether-freezes-150-million-in-usdt/
"Tether has added three more Ethereum addresses, holding more $150 million worth of the USDT stablecoin between them, to its blacklist.

As a centralized company, Tether is able to blacklist addresses it believes are involved in crime, money laundering — or for any other reason it chooses.

This is the first time Tether has blacklisted an address in 2022 but it added 312 addresses to the blacklist last year and has added 563 all up since it first did so on Nov. 28, 2017."

[zasad@]

Not a new article, but it has a lot of interesting things about the manipulators that control Tether.
Tether Papers: This is exactly who acquired 70% of all USDT ever issued
https://protos.com/tether-papers-crypto-stablecoin-usdt-investigation-analysis/

This market is highly manipulated and driven by printed tokens.

[zasad@]

Tether Blacklists Ethereum Address Linked to Multichain Hack
The address, containing more than $715,000 of USDT stablecoins, traces back to hackers who stole $3 million from Multichain users.
https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/02/11/tether-blacklists-ethereum-address-linked-to-multichain-hack/

https://etherscan.io/address/0xd37448ad7949c4ad8eba5aad1a0afdd3199971d8

[zasad@]

There are a lot of rumors on the Internet about the tether scam.
The company had to make an official statement

https://tether.to/en/tether-condemns-false-rumours-about-its-commercial-paper-holdings/
Tether Condemns False Rumours About Its Commercial Paper Holdings

"Tether can report that its current portfolio of commercial paper has since been further reduced to 11 billion (from 20 billion at the end of Q1 2022), and will be 8.4 billion by end June 2022. This will gradually decrease to zero without any incurrences of losses. All commercial papers are expiring and will be rolled into US Treasuries with a short maturity."

[zasad@]

https://cointelegraph.com/news/tether-cto-refutes-stablecoin-fud-as-short-sellers-circle
https://twitter.com/paoloardoino/status/1541418818664292355?
"Tether CTO refutes stablecoin FUD as short-sellers circle
Paolo Ardoino alleged some hedge funds are trying to create pressure “in the billions” to “harm Tether liquidity” so that they can eventually buy back tokens at a much lower price."

[RussianEnglishTranslation]

https://cointelegraph.com/news/tether-cto-refutes-stablecoin-fud-as-short-sellers-circle
https://twitter.com/paoloardoino/status/1541418818664292355?
"Tether CTO refutes stablecoin FUD as short-sellers circle
Paolo Ardoino alleged some hedge funds are trying to create pressure “in the billions” to “harm Tether liquidity” so that they can eventually buy back tokens at a much lower price."

USDT and USDC are less safe than other crypto projects on Ethereum like DAI and 0xMR because they can blacklist wallets and freeze tokens. Be careful using stablecoins. I'm curious to see if stablecoins will have similar functionality on other chains like the internet computer when they officially launch DeFi.

[zasad@]

https://tether.to/ru/tether-discloses-celsius-loan-liquidation-process
Tether Discloses Celsius' Loan Liquidation Process
"While Tether’s portfolio does include an investment in Celsius, representing a minimal part of its shareholder’s equity, there is no correlation between this investment and Tether’s own reserves or stability. The Tether loan that was taken out by Celsius was an overcollateralized loan denominated in BTC (130%+), and the decision to liquidate the collateral to cover the loan was a part of the original terms of the agreement between the two entities and reconfirmed in writing before the start of the liquidation event. This process was carried out in a way to minimise as much as possible any impact on the markets and in fact, once the loan was covered, Tether returned the remaining part to Celsius as per its agreement. Celsius position has been liquidated with no losses to Tether."

[zasad@]

https://www.circle.com/blog/providing-greater-transparency?
Circle continues enhancing our transparency and today we shared a detailed look at the assets backing the USDC reserve.
https://twitter.com/circlepay/status/1547648398374817792?
"The USDC reserve is held solely in cash and 3-month U.S. Treasuries, held in segregated accounts for the benefit of USDC holders, and is entirely separate from Circle’s operations. The USDC reserve is subject to all the same protections under U.S. state and federal law as afforded to other large scale payments innovators entrusted by millions of customers with tens of billions of dollars of customer assets"
0Reports/USDC%20Reserve%20Breakdown_June.pdf

___________________________________

Jul 27 2022
https://tether.to/en/tether-combats-false-information-to-preserve-the-reputation-of-the-cryptocurrency-ecosystem/

Tether Combats False Information to Preserve the Reputation of the Cryptocurrency Ecosystem

"Plain and simple.

Tether’s portfolio holds no Chinese commercial paper and as of today, its total commercial paper exposure has been reduced yet again to a mere ~3.7B (from 30B in July 2021) with plans to further decrease to ~200M by the end of August 2022 and to zero by end of October/early November 2022."

[zasad@]

Uncharted | The Responsibility of Trust
https://www.circle.com/blog/the-responsibility-of-trust
"On Monday, August 8 the systems we have in place to comply with applicable law and government regulations worked. Centre, the consortium behind USDC, followed the U.S. Treasury sanctions against Tornado Cash and blocked the related addresses.

Circle also complied with these sanctions and blocked the addresses on our platform, cutting off USDC access from Circle Accounts to and from the Tornado Cash sanctioned addresses.  We expect that nearly every responsible digital asset service provider in the world has also followed suit and blocked access to Tornado Cash addresses.  "

[zasad@]

https://www.theblock.co/post/164272/tether-bdo-italia-partnership-usdt-reserve-attestations
"Stablecoin issuer Tether announced Thursday that it has partnered with BDO Italia, the Italian arm of the world's fifth largest accounting firm, to issue assurance and attestation reports of its reserves.

Tether has previously worked with two Cayman Islands-based accounting firms, Moore Cayman and MHA Cayman. Tether's BDO Italia partnership means it will no longer work with Moore and MHA, the company told The Block. The Block could not immediately reach out to BDO Italia for a comment."

[zasad@]

https://tether.to/en/tether-releases-independent-auditor-report-from-top-5-accounting-firm-bdo-reinforcing-its-dedication-to-transparency-and-revealing-another-major-cut-to-commercial-paper-holdings/

"The Management of the Company asserts the following as of 30 June 2022:

The Group’s consolidated total assets amount to at least US$ 66,409,619,424.

The Group’s consolidated total liabilities amount to US$66,218,725,778, of which US$ 66, 204,234,509 relates to digital tokens issued.

The Group’s consolidated assets exceed its consolidated liabilities.

The total gross consolidated contractual redemption value related to all digital tokens issued, including those held by the Group is equal to US$ 66,430,393,253.

The consolidated amount related to digital tokens held by the Group but not in its treasury wallet is equal to US$ 226,158,744."


https://assets.ctfassets.net/vyse88cgwfbl/2xJyKdUKicdRUWpC9buRWR/544a579335ae65ed0e08c162c5a2c5d9/Std_ISAE_3000R_Opinion_30-6-2022_RC134792022BD0303.pdf

Tether management said that such reports would be released monthly.

[Vvang]

Are you saying that all these blocked addresses are legit USdT users? I doubt that because I know usdt users with large amount of money and their address never get blocked, I suspect that affected users are into illegal stuffs.

[zasad@]

Are you saying that all these blocked addresses are legit USdT users? I doubt that because I know usdt users with large amount of money and their address never get blocked, I suspect that affected users are into illegal stuffs.

I know no more about the reasons for blocking wallets than you do. This information is private.
Tether hasn't had an audit report for many years, and from this audit report we can see that they do business with the US because they hold almost half of their assets in US Treasury.

https://assets.ctfassets.net/vyse88cgwfbl/2xJyKdUKicdRUWpC9buRWR/544a579335ae65ed0e08c162c5a2c5d9/Std_ISAE_3000R_Opinion_30-6-2022_RC134792022BD0303.pdf

one of the blocked addresses
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5407489


____

https://cointelegraph.com/news/stablecoin-issuers-hold-more-us-debt-than-berkshire-hathaway-report
Stablecoin issuers hold more US debt than Berkshire Hathaway: Report

"Tether, Circle and other stablecoin firms held $80 billion worth of short-term U.S. government debt as of May 2022, more than owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway."

[zasad@]

https://cointelegraph.com/news/0-3-fall-in-assets-could-render-tether-technically-insolvent-wsj
0.3% fall in assets ‘could render Tether technically insolvent:’ WSJ


https://www.wsj.com/articles/tether-says-audit-is-still-months-away-as-crypto-market-falters-11661568971
Tether Says Audit Is Still Months Away as Crypto Market Falters

[zasad@]

https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/09/13/crypto-lender-maker-turns-to-staked-ether-to-reduce-usdc-influence/
"Crypto lending platform Maker, the world's largest decentralized-finance (DeFi) app, doubled the debt ceiling of its staked ether (stETH) vault this week as it looks to reduce its reliance on centralized stablecoins after Centre, the issuer of USD coin (USDC), blacklisted 38 addresses linked to sanctioned crypto tool Tornado Cash.
More than 34% of all assets locked on USDC are locked on Maker, and the tokens are the single-largest source of collateral that backs DAI, Maker’s native decentralized stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar. Approval of the proposal to raise the ceiling to $200 million allows more stETH to be deposited against DAI, reducing USDC’s influence."

[zasad@]

https://blog.coin98.com/introducing-cusd/
Introducing CUSD - The Next Liquidity Solution for The Cross-chain Economy
"Coin98 is excited to roll out CUSD, the decentralized stablecoin of Coin98 ecosystem.
Today, we are excited to introduce the next building block in our ecosystem - a brand new unit of account for the cross-chain economy - the Coin98 Dollar, also known as CUSD."

____________
by Tether | Oct 13 2022
Tether Slashes Commercial Paper to Zero
https://tether.to/en/tether-slashes-commercial-paper-to-zero/

[zasad@]

https://twitter.com/justinsuntron/status/1580091236916289538?
"Dominica 🇩🇲 is the first country in the world to designate blockchain as their national infrastructure and it is #TRON. I changed my name ticker into Dominica 🇩🇲flag. I may suggest to move
@HuobiGlobal
 exchange to Dominica as the national exchange 😎"

Dominica Selects TRON as its National Blockchain to Issue the Country's Official Coin
https://www.benzinga.com/content/29229647/dominica-selects-tron-as-its-national-blockchain-to-issue-the-countrys-official-coin

[zasad@]

https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/10/31/us-tether-bank-fraud-investigation-changes-hands-within-the-doj-report/
US Tether Bank Fraud Investigation Changes Hands Within the DOJ: Report
"The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York will now be handling the investigation, Bloomberg reported Monday.
A criminal investigation into whether Tether’s executives committed bank fraud in the early days of the stablecoin issuer’s existence has been reassigned after months of stagnation, according to Bloomberg.
The Department of Justice’s (DOJ) probe will now be led by U.S. Attorney Damian Williams in the Southern District of New York (SDNY), Bloomberg said, citing people familiar with the matter."

[zasad@]

https://www.circle.com/en/pressroom/circle-to-bring-euro-coin-and-cross-chain-transfer-protocol-to-solana-in-early-2023

Circle to Bring Euro Coin and Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol to Solana in Early 2023
"LISBON, BOSTON, November 6, 2022 — On stage at Solana Breakpoint today, Circle, a global digital financial technology firm and the issuer of USD Coin (USDC) and Euro Coin, announced plans to expand native support of Euro Coin and access to their new permissionless cross-chain infrastructure, Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol, on Solana in the first half of 2023. The announcement marks the company’s first in a series of intended commitments to provide expanded support for both initiatives since their respective launch announcements in June and September. "