Tether Freezes 150 Million USDT

Tether has added 3 more Ethereum addresses to its blacklist, which hold more than $150 million worth of the USDT stablecoin.

As a centralized company, Tether can blacklist addresses it deems involved in crime, money laundering, or any other reason.

This is the first time Tether has blacklisted an address in 2022, but it blacklisted 312 addresses last year, an increase of 563 addresses since it first did so on November 28, 2017 .

Tether did not disclose why the three new addresses were blacklisted, but it has used its powers to blacklist addresses involved in cyberattacks and law enforcement investigations. After Kucoin was hacked in September 2020, Tether froze about $35 million in USDT to prevent hackers from exploiting its theft.

There may also be “precautionary reasons” for blacklisting addresses, such as being related to scams, Arcane Asset Chief Investment Officer Eric Wall pointed out, which is another reason for freezing Tether in 2020.

Concerns over a lack of decentralization may be a factor driving adoption of the TerraUSD (UST) stablecoin on algorithmic stablecoin blockchain Terra. It is currently the fourth largest stablecoin with a market cap of $10.6 billion. However, the decentralized challenger’s market capitalization still pales in comparison to USDT, the fourth-largest cryptocurrency with a market capitalization of $78.5 billion.

Do Kwon, founder of Terra, responded to the news about Tether on Twitter, stating that there is no way to blacklist UST addresses.

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