DFC

"the tether price steadily crept back toward dollar parity, bolstered by the redemption of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of USDT tokens, which helped restore confidence in issuer Tether Limited’s claim that it is holding enough funds to cover the outstanding tokens. As CCN reported, those redemptions caused tether’s market circulating supply and market cap to plummet throughout the month. Two transactions made last Thursday diminished the USDT supply by a further 100 million, reducing the USDT supply to 1.9 billion units, down nearly one-third from the more than 2.8 billion tokens that were circulating just three weeks ago."

"Tether, which aims to keep its token (called tether or USDT) at parity with the U.S. dollar by backing each token with $1 in bank deposits, accounts for the vast majority of the stablecoin market by total value, exchange volume and other metrics. But the market has begun to show signs of anxiety around tether, centering on the firm's access to banking services and its claims to have fully collateralized the outstanding tether supply."

Despite now having more than double the assets on their exchange versus a year ago, Coinbase's latest add, the listing of a dollar pegged cryptocurrency, inches the firm towards their 'Open Financial System' goals, akin to a suite of banking products.

We have published an update of the developments in the cryptocurrency markets including what we are hearing from our clients.

Since Oct. 14 Bitfinex – an exchange that shares common ownership and management with Tether Ltd., the company behind USDT – has sent 930 million USDT to a wallet controlled by Tether Ltd. known as the "treasury." These tokens are considered to have been removed from circulation, and though many of them still exist, Tether destroyed 500 million USDT last week.

Having launched in March, TUSD had a head start in the race to replace tether. When Gemini Dollar (GUSD) and Paxos Standard (PAX) began circulating on Sept. 10, TUSD had already issued $79 million worth of tokens. According to Stablecoins War, TUSD remains the largest stablecoin upstart, with its market cap having more than doubled to $174 million over the past two months.

Stably announced Thursday that its StableUSD (USDS) is now available for purchase and redemption. The token is backed by U.S. dollars held in escrow by Prime Trust, a regulated trust company in Nevada that has carved out a niche playing this supporting role in a number of stablecoin projects.

Not less than 12 exchanges, according to an official blog post from Circle, have expressed their plans of joining the ecosystem for the incorporation of the USD coin. The exchanges are BitMart, Fcoin, Gatecoin, Hanbitco, Hotbit, SWIFT, OCP Capital, DDEX and Bit-Z. The world’s first instant crypto-backed loan provider; Nexo also disclosed the ongoing process of adding the stablecoin. Users of Shenzhen-based cryptocurrency startup Bitkan and wallet provider Tokenary can as well store and use USDC to carry out various services.

"The chairman of Deltec Bank & Trust says a widely scrutinized letter about stablecoin issuer Tether's  account at the Bahamas-based institution is "authentic.""

A Swiss company, Alprockz AG, has developed the cryptocurrency ROCKZ, and says it is the first coin paired to one of the most stable fiat currencies in the world — the Swiss Franc (CHF). According to the company, it has already partnered with Geneva Swiss Bank - GSbanque.

The Hong Kong division of global accounting and consulting firm PwC is exploring the best practices for issuing stablecoins, as part of an initiative with the non-profit Loopring Foundation. Announced Tuesday, PwC Hong Kong's Asia-focused study on stablecoins follows a PwC partnership in the U.S. to advise decentralized lending platform Cred, which is working on a U.S. dollar-tied coin.

"The U.S. dollar-pegged crypto token CarbonUSD has just launched as the first stablecoin on the EOS platform. The token's developer, Carbon, announced the news in a press release Friday, adding that it believes making the token interoperable across "key" blockchain networks will provide "most value for the crypto industry in the long-term." CarbonUSD, which has been live on ethereum for two months, can now be transferred onto the EOS blockchain, giving users "even lower fees and faster settlement than on ethereum," according to the firm."

A “stablecoin” is an attempt to create a synthetic asset that is “more stable” than its underlying constituents. In this article we prove that the only workable stablecoins are those that are composed of a simple (weighted) average of assets, more commonly called a “basket” or simply, “diversification of your portfolio”.

"Three weeks after being assured that everything was running smoothly, some customers of cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex are wondering why they still can't withdraw their money."

"In the volatile world of crypto where a coin can be worth five cents one day and five dollars two months later, the idea of a “stablecoin” — a cryptocurrency whose price experiences relatively little volatility — seems like an oxymoron. Yet more and more stablecoins are appearing these days: just last month, Paxos, Gemini, and Circle all launched their own high-profile stablecoins."

"Switzerland-based fintech firm X8 AG has received a certification from the Shariyah Review Bureau (SRB) for its Ethereum-based stablecoin. SRB is a leading Sharia consultancy and audit firm licensed by the central bank of Bahrain."

"There are now about 120 stablecoin projects under way, according to Stable Report, a crypto research group. While they represent a small fraction of the wider cryptocurrency market, the value of all stablecoins stands at about $3bn, and their issuers have attracted some $350m in venture capital funding to date from the likes of Bain Capital Ventures, Google Ventures and Andreesen Horowitz, a report by cryptocurrency wallet provider Blockchain found."

"As this brief survey demonstrates, existing stablecoin models represent a spectrum of tradeoffs between functionality, scalability, and decentralization, and offer varying levels of security and vulnerability to failures. Intensifying competition in the field will definitely push the more viable designs to the surface, and there is hope that eventually solutions that are at the same time secure, scalable, and decentralized will emerge in the market. Meanwhile, experts look at the sector’s near prospects rather optimistically."

"Basis took Robert Sams’ Seigniorage Shares concept and developed it into a simple and elegant decentralized stablecoin protocol, which they very skillfully communicated to the public. Unfortunately, despite an honest and pioneering effort, I expect Basis to fail. They have taken many steps in the right direction, but ultimately they will not succeed in creating a reliable stablecoin."

"The crypto market took a turn for the worse on Wednesday when it lost nearly $30 billion in total market capitalization – but not every asset struggled to find buyers."

BitPay today expanded its stable of stablecoin offerings for merchant settlement to include the new Paxos Standard, the most heavily traded of the recently-launched group of “regulated stablecoins.” As CCN reported in October, BitPay has already added support for Circle’s USD Coin and Gemini’s GUSD. It has apparently decided not to support USDT — or Tether –which was the world’s first major “stablecoin” and has the backing of giant fiat-crypto margin-supporting exchange Bitfinex.

"As Bitcoin plunges, the U.S. Justice Department is investigating whether last year’s epic rally was fueled in part by manipulation, with traders driving it up with Tether -- a popular but controversial digital token."

"Grant Thornton LLP, the U.S. branch of Grant Thornton International, reported in an attestation dated Nov. 16 that Circle had $127,412,240.89 held in custody accounts as of Oct. 31, 2018, slightly exceeding the 127,408,827 USDC tokens in circulation at the time."

"CEMENT IS A BASKET OF MANY STABLECOINS: Stablecoin holders can deposit their stablecoins into the Cement Mixer (that’s what we’re calling the basket), to benefit from increased liquidity, greater stability and protection from risk."