Bitfinex Tackle Tether & List Four New Stablecoins

Bitfinex Tackle Tether & List Four New Stablecoins

Bitfinex, one of the world’s leading cryptocurrency exchanges have listed four new stablecoins according to reports, in an attempt to shred some of the growing market share of Tether. Over the past day, the market capitalisation of Tether has shot up, suggesting that more USDT Tokens have entered the markets, something that is likely to have caused the recent plunge in the price of Bitcoin.

By listing further stablecoins, investors that use Bitfinex are given access to further alternatives, meaning they won’t be forced to choose between USDT or DAI (the two stablecoins currently active on the Bitfinex exchange). This in turn means some of the Tether monopoly has shrunk.

The stablecoins added to Bitfinex are USDC, TUSD, PAX and GUSD. The sister exchange of Bitfinex - Ethfinex, will also be listing these new additions to. According to the official Bitfinex announcement:

“From today customers of Bitfinex and Ethfinex will be able to trade all six major stablecoins on both exchanges. At Bitfinex and Ethfinex we are dedicated to providing a high quality, unbiased meeting place for every ecosystem and customer. We were the first to introduce alternative stablecoins onto our platform, including Dai (an Ethereum collateralised stablecoin), and now proudly introduce the following established stablecoins: USDC, True USD, Paxos, and Gemini USD. All stablecoins on Bitfinex and Ethfinex will be traded against USD.”

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UDSC (US Dollar Coin) has recently seen a big push for adoption and is now listed on over 35 exchanges across the globe, with further adoption from around 70 wallets and other protocols too. As a result of this, many believe that USDC will be a solid competitor to Tether, the most popular stablecoin as the time of writing.

Bitfinex Tackle Tether

As stated earlier, there are many issues with the monopoly that Tether holds within the markets and as a result, USDT has been associated with Bitcoin manipulation for quite a while now. Bitfinex have been accused of allowing this to happen quite recently, therefore we see this move as a defence against such allegations. It seems that Bitfinex are finally trying to open up to a more adaptive and versatile stablecoin market, one that gives investors a real democratic choice, that’s what cryptocurrency is all about after all.

According to Finance Magnates:

“The close ties [between Tether and Bitfinex], along with an explosion in the amount of Tether dollars in circulation, caused a number of conspiracy theories to form, alleging that both companies were working together to print Tether dollars that had no actual asset-backing. Things became even more serious when the New York Times published the findings of two researchers at the University of Texas suggesting that there could be some truth to the theories.”

Whilst the publication from the University of Texas was soon debunked, it did cause a bit of a stir in the markets during 2018 and thus, ever since, people have been very wary of the true capacity of Tether when it comes to market manipulation.

We can’t help but notice the coincidental timing between the most recent market crash and the sudden climb in the market cap of Tether, but hey, we’re just speculating…

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