What is the purpose of developing Plasma + Stable Tether at the same time?

Many people undoubtedly feel resentful of missing out on @PlasmaFDN and are eagerly anticipating Tether's stablecoin chain, @Stable. Of course, many are also confused: Why is @Tether pursuing a dual-edged strategy of Plasma and Stable? Will Stable issue a token? What exactly is Tether, the king of stablecoins, up to? Let me share my understanding: Simply put: Tether's dual-edged strategy of Plasma and Stable is effectively a bid to recoup the market dividends it has ceded to Ethereum and Tron over the years, achieving a major business model transformation from a stablecoin issuer to a global payment infrastructure provider. 1) Let's first discuss the issue of reclaiming the pie. Currently, USDT has a market capitalization of $170 billion, with an annual transaction volume exceeding even that of PayPal and Visa combined. Tether, on the other hand, only earns 3-4% of Treasury bond interest. While this translates to $13 billion in annual profit, it pales in comparison to the value it actually creates. How do you understand this? For example, USDT, a key component of DeFi liquidity, generates annual transaction fees that are actually paid to the Ethereum network (fluctuating gas fees). This fee cost is borne by users and captured by the Ethereum network, while Tether does not profit from it. If Tether launched its own stablecoin chain, theoretically, this portion of the transaction fees could be pocketed. Furthermore, it's no secret that Tron has profited immensely from USDT payment demand, with revenue expected to reach nearly $2 billion in 2024 alone. Tether doesn't directly benefit from this revenue. Therefore, Tether's direct motivation for combining Plasma and Stable is to reclaim the DeFi ecosystem's revenue, including USDT transaction fees and payment service fees, that have long been held by Ethereum and Tron. This severely limits Tether's control over its vast USDT stablecoin economy. With the maturation and rollout of Plasma and Stable infrastructure, it's time to reclaim these long-ceded dividends. 2) So, how should we understand the respective positioning of Plasma and Stable?

Plasma $XPL is a stablecoin chain backed by Tether's sister company @bitfinex and invested in by @peterthiel. It is positioned as a consumer-oriented platform, with Bitcoin providing security and censorship resistance. Its killer feature is to challenge PayPal's payment position in TradFi, while integrating 100+ DeFi protocols to siphon off native Crypto returns.

For example, the Plasma One neo bank product matrix offers a 10% passive savings benefit and a 4% cashback debit card. If there are no regulatory obstacles, it will definitely cause a stir in the traditional payment industry and seize market share from legacy payment systems like PayPal.

For another example, Plasma integrates the entire Crypto infrastructure through EVM compatibility, aiming to @aave@ethena_labs

It's also important to incorporate other highly profitable protocols into its revenue mix to consolidate its debit card interest-earning advantage. Otherwise, why does Plasma One offer a 10% savings return on top of its 4% government bond yield? Furthermore, Plasma has introduced dedicated channels, using paymasters to subsidize users' gas fees. This shifts the network congestion costs required to operate the Crypto DeFi ecosystem onto the protocol itself, enabling zero-fee interactions. This is highly attractive to end-users. Stable, a "pure USDT" stablecoin chain planned to be issued by Tether itself, is a B2B payment chain that uses USDT as its gas fee and settlement layer, and will likely focus on payment and settlement scenarios. Based on this understanding, two questions are answered: 1. Will Stable issue new coins? According to a recent interview with Tether CEO @paoloardoino, Stable will minimize complexity and will not add additional token mechanisms. In other words, no new coins will be issued for the time being; $USDT will be the only token issued. 2. What is the purpose of Stable's existence? It is likely to replace Tron's USDT ecosystem, aiming to integrate business-to-business payment channels. For example, it recently introduced PayPal's PYUSD. It seems that Stable intends to serve as a settlement layer between stablecoins, further strengthening USDT's position as the leading stablecoin. Moreover, if Stable issues new coins, it will directly impact XPL's ability to capture value within the ecosystem. Plasma and Stable are fully interoperable, using XPL tokens to incentivize channel partners on Stable, helping various stablecoin issuers better utilize Stable for settlement. At the same time, integrating with Plasma can capture the value siphoned from the entire USDT ecosystem. So, if Plasma realizes its ambition to rival PayPal and restructure traditional payment infrastructure, and if it achieves its goal of recycling the value of Crypto's years of DeFi stablecoin economic vitality, will you still consider the current FDV of 12B high? Of course, business ambition and actual implementation are two different things. Native crypto ecosystems like Ethereum and Tron won't sit idly by and watch Plasma steal their market share, and user migration takes time. Traditional payment giants like Paypal and Visa won't surrender easily either. What if regulators determine the 10% reserve for their Plasma One is illegal? Clearly, there's still a lot of uncertainty. But one thing is certain: Tether, after years of operating as a stablecoin issuer, is now aiming for the even more ambitious goal of becoming a global payments infrastructure giant. Whether or not this can be achieved isn't important; what matters most is how many opportunities we, as the runners-up, can seize!