Stablecoin
|5 min ReadTether’s Golden Obsession: From Bullion to a Central Bank of Its Own
Carter Hayes
Senior Analyst
Published
Jan 16, 2026
In 2025, the world’s central banks went on a record gold-buying spree — over 1,100 tons in a single year. Yet one buyer outshone many of them: not a nation, but a crypto giant. Tether, issuer of the $USDT stablecoin, has quietly become one of the biggest holders of physical gold on Earth.
Bloomberg reports that by September 2025, Tether held more than $12.9 billion worth of gold, vaulting it into the world’s top 30 national-equivalent reserves, ahead of countries like Australia and Denmark. Over the past year, it has been adding more than one ton per week, trailing only Kazakhstan and Brazil in the global accumulation race.
And this isn’t “paper gold.” Tether buys the bars — real, deliverable bullion. The company has built its own vault in Switzerland, which CEO Paolo Ardoino calls “one of the most secure in the world,” and is now constructing a second one in Singapore to anchor its Asian operations and support the growth of its gold-backed stablecoin, XAU₮.
Tether is no longer just a fintech firm. It’s building the hardware and reserve structure of a global central bank — without a nation-state.
From vaults to mines: Tether’s gold supply chain play
Tether’s ambitions stretch far beyond stacking bars. Its gold strategy now spans three layers: mining rights, bullion reserves, and tokenized gold.
At the top sits Tether Gold (XAU₮) — one token for one ounce of physical gold held in its Swiss vaults, fully compliant with LBMA “Good Delivery” standards. With more than 370,000 ounces (about 11 tons) backing it, XAU₮ has become a $2.1 billion market, the largest regulated on-chain gold product.
But Tether isn’t satisfied with financial tokens alone. Through its investment arm Tether Investments, the company bought a major stake in Elemental Altus Royalties, a Canadian-listed firm that owns royalties and streaming rights in producing and near-production gold mines. With an eventual holding that could exceed one-third of the company’s shares and a $100 million follow-up injection, Tether has effectively entered the mining business — owning a slice of future gold output itself.
It has also reportedly approached other mining ventures such as Terranova Resources, signaling its intent to build a vertically integrated “gold matrix” — spanning extraction, refining, trading, and tokenization.
The logic is bold and simple: control both the physical and digital layers of gold. On the top end, XAU₮ captures user demand through tokenized access; on the bottom, royalties and mines secure the long-term metal supply that backs those tokens.
Why gold? The philosophy of a stateless central bank
At first glance, Tether’s gold binge looks like FOMO — joining central banks in buying “safe” assets. But a closer read of its executive statements reveals something deeper: a deliberate attempt to build a dual-anchored balance sheet for a “stateless central bank,” with Bitcoin and gold as its twin pillars.
Paolo Ardoino, now CEO, has repeatedly said he dislikes calling Bitcoin “digital gold.” To him, gold is “nature’s Bitcoin” — equally scarce, equally enduring, one physical and one digital.
In his words: “As the world grows darker, Tether will continue investing profits in Bitcoin, gold, and land — assets that outlive any fiat currency.”
This belief has shaped how Tether manages its massive profits. It already holds over $120 billion in U.S. Treasuries, making it one of the largest private holders of American debt. But since 2023, it has been redirecting quarterly profits into “hard assets” — first Bitcoin, then gold — to hedge against rate cycles, credit risks, and geopolitical shocks.
Tether’s rationale rests on three layers:
1. Convert profits into assets no one can print.High rates have delivered Tether record profits — over 15 billion in 2025. But Ardoino knows this “yield feast” won’t last. Turning cash into gold and Bitcoin transforms temporary profit into enduring value.
2. Hedge against the U.S. financial system itself.USDT’s $120 billion footprint makes it comparable to a small national currency system. If U.S. regulators or banks ever freeze its assets, a Treasury-heavy balance sheet could become a liability. Gold, custodied in Tether’s own vaults, is immune to such pressure.
3. Lead the tokenized asset era.Gold is the most universally accepted real-world asset (RWA). By making XAU₮ fully backed by audited bars, Tether has created a compliance-ready bridge between physical commodities and on-chain finance — a product that DeFi protocols already use as collateral for synthetic dollars like aUSDT on the Alloy by Tether platform.
In essence, Tether is reengineering the gold market through crypto rails — tokenizing reserves while investing directly in the mines that produce them. It’s a hybrid model of industrial control and financial engineering.
Building a new monetary order
Every step of Tether’s strategy mimics the architecture of a central bank — but without borders. It issues its own currency (USDT), holds sovereign debt (U.S. Treasuries), and now builds a reserve base of Bitcoin and gold that no government can seize.
It’s not chasing yield anymore. It’s building sovereignty.
And in a future where multiple currencies coexist, Tether’s balance sheet — built on U.S. debt, Bitcoin, and gold — might not just be an investment portfolio.
It might be the blueprint for the first non-state central bank.
Disclaimer: This document is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The views expressed in this document are not, and should not be taken as, investment advice or recommendations. Recipients should do their own due diligence, taking into account their specific financial circumstances, investment objectives and risk tolerance, which are not considered here, before investing. This document is not an offer, or the solicitation of an offer, to buy or sell any of the assets mentioned.