Tether Holdings Limited, a company behind the world’s largest stablecoin Tether (USDT), has released an assurance opinion to confirm that Tether tokens are fully backed by its reserves. In a statement shared on Twitter Tuesday, Tether provided the company’s Consolidated Reserves Report, or CRR, accompanied by an assurance report from accounting network Moore Cayman. Signed on March 26, the accountant’s report intends to prove the accuracy of Tether’s CRR compiled on Feb. 28. “In our opinion, the CRR as prepared by the management of Tether Holdings Limited Group as of February 2021 at 11:59 PM UTC is presented in accordance …

John Glen, the United Kingdom's financial services minister, has said that stablecoins will be the main focus of the government’s crypto regulatory activity. Glen made delivered his comments while addressing a conference organized by City & Financial Global on Tuesday, Reuters reported. For Glen, the U.K.’s decision to prioritize stablecoins over regulating the broader financial market is due to fears of monopolies emerging in the market based on the limited number of participants offering fiat-pegged cryptocurrency payment services. “There is the potential for some firms to swiftly achieve dominance and crowd out other players, due to their ability to scale …

Stablecoins like Tether (USDT) and USD Coin (USDC) have hit another milestone in terms of accumulation by exchanges. According to market data provider CryptoQuant, stablecoin holdings on global crypto exchanges soared to a new all-time high on March 28, exceeding $10 billion. Cryptocurrency exchanges are now holding nearly 16% of the total market value of all stablecoins, with stablecoin market capitalization amounting to $63 billion at the time of writing, according to data from CoinGecko. The total trading volume of all stablecoins is estimated at about $88 billion. According to CryptoQuant data, volumes of stablecoin holdings on exchanges have been …

For Brad Smith, president of the Microsoft Corporation, fintech firms have no business issuing private digital currencies. According to Bloomberg, Smith gave these remarks while speaking at an online conference organized by the Bank for International Settlements. As part of his address, Smith argued that money supply should exclusively be under the aegis of governments and central banks. Smith said that it is important that only entities that protect the common good should be left to control currency operations, adding, “I am not a big fan myself of encouraging or asking or wanting us [tech firms] to participate in the …

Agustín Carstens, general manager of the Bank for International Settlements, has called for even more crypto regulations stating that virtual currencies are a tool for circumventing financial laws. In an interview with CNBC on Wednesday, the BIS general manager identified money laundering and terrorism financing as areas that require more robust cryptocurrency regulations. Carstens’s comments, a common refrain among crypto critics, come despite the preponderance of established facts indicating that crypto criminality occupies a minute proportion of global cryptocurrency commerce. According to Carstens, cryptocurrencies have a notoriety for being instruments of criminal activities due to the pseudonymous nature of virtual …

Kevin Weil, the vice president of product at Facebook's digital wallet unit and one of the creators of the Libra token, now called Diem, will be leaving the social media giant. In a Twitter thread today, Weil said he would be leaving Facebook after almost three years to become the president of product and business at San Francisco-based space and analytics company, Planet Labs. He was one of the leaders of the social media firm’s digital wallet unit — once called Calibra, now Novi — in addition to being behind the Facebook-backed Libra token, now Diem. “Imagine instead if financial …

The Bank of Thailand has issued a stern warning against a privately issued stablecoin pegged to the national currency, the Thai Baht. According to a Bangkok Post report on March 18, the central bank has told citizens that Thai Baht Digital (THT) has no legal assurances or protection and that users could be at risk of cyber theft or money laundering Citing a sixty-year-old law, the central bank's assistant governor of the legal group, Pruettipong Srimachand, stated that any activities involving the stablecoin are considered illegal: “The creation, issuance, usage or circulation of any material or token for money is …

Groupe Casino, a 120-year-old retail company headquartered in France, will reportedly be launching a stablecoin pegged to the Euro. According to journalist Grégory Raymond, the French retail giant will be launching the stablecoin to use in its stores’ loyalty programs as well as for trading. Groupe Casino oversees more than 11,000 stores in France and Latin America. The coin has reportedly been developed using the Tezos protocol in partnership with crypto exchange Coinhouse, accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, stablecoin infrastructure provider Sceme, research and development firm Nomadic Labs, and financial services group Societe Generale. The new stablecoin, called the Lugh — named …

Bitcoin (BTC) pared some gains, dipping below $60,000 on March 14, a day after setting a new all-time high of $61,950 on Binance. However, on-chain data indicates that the uptrend is likely to continue in the near term. One key metric that is signaling an optimistic short-term trend for Bitcoin is the rise in stablecoin deposits into exchanges. Although high funding rates and an overcrowded market are causing the price to pull back, the entrance of sidelined capital into the crypto market may further boost Bitcoin's momentum. Why Bitcoin dropped after $60K breach When Bitcoin enters price discovery and hits …

Auckland-based financial service provider Techemynt announced the launch of a stablecoin reportedly backed by the New Zealand dollar. In a statement from Techemynt today, the firm announced it had launched a cryptocurrency backed 1:1 by the New Zealand dollar and deployed on the Ethereum blockchain by Blockchain Labs. Techemynt is a registered financial service provider with the country’s major financial watchdog, the Financial Markets Authority. The firm said it would be offering the $NZD stablecoin directly to any customers who want to purchase more than $100,000 NZD worth — roughly $70,000 USD. Crypto users can also find the token on …

While Bitcoin (BTC) and major altcoins tend to garner most of the attention from investors, there are several projects that aim to bring greater decentralization, transparency, accountability and financial inclusion to society and businesses. For the past few months, Cointelegraph has been identifying such projects extensively and several of the tokens recently highlighted have seen a massive surge in their performance. A good investor should keep track of how all the assets in their portfolio perform and during occasional reviews the underperformers should be removed and additional capital deployed toward the assets that continue to produce profits. In this new …

Nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and high-yielding decentralized finance (DeFi) platforms have been the focus of attention in the cryptocurrency sector for the past few months. This intense focus on NFTs, DeFi and Bitcoin's (BTC) price action means that some investors have glossed over the fact that it was a series of positive developments in stablecoins that helped kick off the 2021 bull market. One project that has quietly amassed significant gains this year is Reserve Rights, a dual-token stablecoin platform where all the tokens are backed by a basket of smart contract-managed cryptocurrencies. Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView shows that …