Stablecoin giant Tether is significantly expanding its gold reserves by buying up to 2 tons of gold per week and storing it in secure Swiss vaults. Switzerland has over 370,000 nuclear bunkers, a holdover from the Cold War, that are hardly ever deployed.
However, one of them is a flurry of activity. Tether Holdings SA owns the high-security vault that receives almost a ton of gold every week. It is now the largest known stash of bullion outside of banks and nation-states.
Tether emerges as a major gold market player
Over the past year, Tether has become a major player in the global gold market, contributing to prices surpassing $5,100 an ounce. Chief Executive Officer Paolo Ardoino said, “We are soon becoming basically one of the biggest, let’s say, gold central banks in the world.” However, even in these historic times for the gold market, Tether’s activities stand out.
In 2025, Tether increased its purchases, buying more than 70 tons of gold for its reserves and its own gold stablecoin. That’s more than was reported by almost any single central bank. Only Poland, which increased its reserves by 102 tons, made higher declared purchases.
It also exceeded the purchases made by all but the three largest exchange-traded funds, which result from the combined efforts of tens of thousands of individual investors and traders.
Ardoino stated that the corporation has over 140 tons of gold, the majority of which are its own reserves and the bullion that supports its own gold token. The greatest known hoard of metal, aside from those held by central banks, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and commercial banks whose vaults support the major trading hubs, is estimated to be worth $23 billion.
He went on to say that Tether had been purchasing gold at a rate of about 1 to 2 tons a week, and planned to continue doing so for “definitely the next few months.” When asked whether Tether might reduce its gold purchases, Adroino replied that the firm had not yet made a decision and would evaluate its position every quarter.
Adroino also revealed that Tether makes money from its dollar stablecoin. Currently, the dollar stablecoin has $186 billion in circulation.
Tether expands stablecoin portfolio with XAU₮ and USA₮
Building on its growing gold reserves, through Tether Gold (XAU₮), Tether is further establishing its dominance in the gold-backed stablecoin market.
A Cryptopolitan report dated January 26 found that gold-backed stablecoins saw a sharp rise in market capitalization from over $1.3 billion to over $4 billion in 2025. Of these, XAU₮ dominated both issuance and circulation, making up about 60% of the supply of gold-backed stablecoins in this market.
The report noted that geopolitical fragmentation, historically high gold prices, and rising institutional and digital-native demand for fully on-chain safe-haven assets were the main causes of this.
Tether reported that at the end of quarter four of last year, the total market capitalization of XAU₮ tokens was $2.25 billion, with 409,217.640000 XAU₮ tokens sold and 110,871.660000 XAU₮ available for purchase.
Following these end-of-year data, Tether Gold Investments added more than 27 metric tons of gold to its fund exposure. It outpaced the purchases made by most individual central banks in the same period.
In another Cryptopolitan report on Tuesday, Tether introduced USA₮, a dollar-pegged stablecoin designed for use in U.S. jurisdictions. The GENIUS Act, which governs stablecoin issuance in the United States, was used to issue the stablecoin.
According to Tether, the introduction of USA₮ represents a major turning point for both the firm and the US dollar in the digital space. The new stablecoin “reinforces the strength of the U.S. dollar at a moment when countries are competing to shape the future of money,” according to the cryptocurrency business.
The company further stated that the new stablecoin draws on features such as scale and operational maturity from USDT, the stablecoin that dominates the global market.
