Forensic Financial Research Firm Offers One Million For Details On Tether’s Backing

Forensic financial research firm, Hindenburg Research, has today announced that they are offering a one million dollar bounty to anyone that is in a position to provide details regarding the identity of the financial backers of stablecoin Tether.

Tether is the most used stablecoin and underpins the 2 trillion dollar cryptocurrency market – over 50% of trades are executed via Tether. According to Coinmarketcap, there are currently more than 69 billion Tethers in circulation and the maximum supply is “not available”.

The company behind the stablecoin, Tether Holdings Inc., claims that each Tether is backed 1:1 by “traditional currency” reserves. However, the company’s latest assurance opinion breaks down the assets held by Tether in detail and reveals that over 30 billion of its holding are actually “Commercial Paper and Certificates of Deposit” (i.e. short term loans by corporations). These loans have an average rating of A-1.

Tether has repeatedey been opaque and avoided directly answering questions about the identity of the corporations providing the credit.

Nathan Anderson, founder of Hindenburg Research, said: “We feel strongly that Tether should fully and thoroughly disclose its holdings to the public. In the absence of that disclosure, we are offering a $1,000,000 bounty to anyone who can provide us exclusive detail on Tether’s supposed reserves.”

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The forensic financial research firm believe that Tether is “a growing threat to investors” and seeks to further the public’s knowledge about the risks involved. This echoes the sentiments of other public figures, including SEC Chairman Gary Gensler, who said that if Tether creates a problem “a lot of people are going to get hurt”.

Do you think that the situation with Tether could collapse the crypto markets? How concerned should investors be? Will the identity of Tether’s backers ever be revealed to the public?