FILE PHOTO: Representation of Tether stablecoin cryptocurrency in this illustration taken September 10, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
LONDON, Jan 26 (Reuters) - Tether, issuer of the world's largest stablecoin, added about 27 metric tons of gold to its fund exposure in the fourth quarter of 2025, it said on Monday, broadly unchanged from its third-quarter purchases estimated by analysts at 26 tons.
Gold's 18% rise year-to-date on top of 64% growth in 2025 has seen it break through key psychological resistance levels at $3,000 per ounce in March, $4,000 in October and $5,000 on Monday due to strong investment, central-bank and retail demand amid mounting global tensions.
As spot gold prices have rallied, the crypto company has become a significant source of gold demand due to the high speed of purchases it has reported for reserves backing the Tether USDT stablecoin, a digital dollar with $187 billion worth of tokens in circulation, and the Tether XAUT gold token, worth $2.7 billion.
Each Tether-issued dollar token is intended to represent one U.S. dollar held in reserve. When a user provides Tether with a dollar, the company issues one USDT and holds assets of equivalent value, such as the U.S. Treasury bills. Those reserves are meant to ensure that USDT can be redeemed for dollars if need be. Tether XAUT stablecoin is fully backed by gold.
"We are operating at a scale that now places the Tether Gold Investment Fund alongside sovereign gold holders, and that carries real responsibility," said Paolo Ardoino, Tether CEO, in Tether's statement.
For comparison, Poland's central bank, the most active buyer among central banks reporting their purchases, raised its total reserves by 35 tons in the fourth quarter to 550 tons.
Tether did not say how much gold it held stored in Switzerland for the two products in total.
For the Tether gold token, XAUT, accounting for 60% of the global gold-backed stablecoin supply, Tether held 16.2 tons of gold to back it up as of the end of December.
Its third-quarter audit of reserves for Tether dollar stablecoin, USDT, the latest publicly available, showed stocks of gold worth $12.9 billion as of the end of September, which would be equal to about 104 tons of gold at the market price at that time.
The reserves backing Tether USDT were dominated by the U.S. Treasuries with gold representing only 7% as of the end-September.
(Reporting by Polina Devitt; Editing by Nia Williams)
