According to Bloomberg, Tether has decided against launching its own blockchain due to the saturated market. Despite controlling USDT with a market cap of $117 billion and its wide usage for trading and remittances, Tether found no compelling reason to introduce a new blockchain. The current market dynamics illustrate why this decision was made.
Data from DefiLlama reveals that out of 306 blockchains, the top five control approximately 86% of the total value of assets locked. Ethereum, the most commercially significant blockchain, leads the market with about $87.7 billion in Total Value Locked (TVL) out of the total $133.2 billion across all chains. TRON, a blockchain launched by crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun in 2017, manages $8.1 billion in TVL and handles 49% of the USDT supply. TVL refers to the overall value of crypto deposited in a protocol.
For a blockchain to succeed, it needs high speeds, low fees, viable use cases, and strong security. Ethereum's dominance can be attributed to its first-mover advantage, flexibility for developers to build smart contracts, and its status as the home to the second-most liquid token, despite its high fees. The blockchain ecosystem has evolved into a multichain environment, with builders and issuers finding benefits in being active on various platforms.
Tether's CTO, Paolo Ardoino, stated that the company prefers to remain blockchain-agnostic regarding where its stablecoin trades, as long as it ensures the highest level of security and sustainability. "For us, blockchains are just transport layers," Ardoino said.