Written by: Zhang joy, BlockTempo

Tether, the leading stablecoin issuer of USDT, announced yesterday (24) that it will undergo a strategic transformation and give priority to issuing USDT on community-driven blockchains:

At Tether, we are deeply committed to maintaining a strong and innovative blockchain ecosystem for USDT and all other tokens we issue. To fulfill this commitment, we will continuously evaluate the current transport layer, striving to strike a balance between maintainability, usability, and community benefits.

Tether stops issuing USDT on EOS and Algorand

At the same time, Tether announced in the announcement that after comprehensive consideration, they will suspend the issuance of USDT on the public chains EOS and Algorand, and continue to support protocols or public chains that the community considers useful:

Starting today (June 24, 2024), Tether will stop minting USDT on EOS and Algorand.

In the next 12 months, Tether will continue to redeem USDT on EOS and Algorand as usual. If there are any other changes, we will announce them in a timely manner after evaluation.

Why were EOS and Algorand abandoned by Tether?

According to Tether’s official website, the blockchains on which Tether currently issues USDT include Tron, Ethereum, Solana, Ton, Avalanche, Near, and many other public chains.

  • Among them, Tron has the largest issuance volume, with a total issuance volume of more than 59.8 billion US dollars

  • Ethereum, the second largest cryptocurrency, also has a circulation of nearly $52 billion.

  • Solana, a popular public chain that has been revived, has an issuance volume of about $1.89 billion.

  • Even Ton, which received Tether support only this year, has received $580 million in issuance.

On the other hand, EOS and Algorand, as established public chains, only have issuance volumes of US$85.2 million and US$17.2 million respectively. It seems that they are indeed not attractive enough to users, which may be one of the reasons why they were abandoned by Tether.

On the other hand, some people in the currency circle speculate that according to Tether’s wording in the announcement, “We will carefully evaluate the security architecture of the network to ensure the security, availability and sustainability of the selected blockchain. Our goal It is to allocate resources to places where security and efficiency can be maximized." Tether's move may also imply that EOS and Algorand are not decentralized enough, which may cause Tether to face potential regulatory risks in the future.

However, this speculation has not been confirmed by Tether, and it is highly likely that they will not make any announcement in the future. However, we can continue to observe whether Tether will continue to cancel support for more public chains or add other public chains.