Tether expands gold reserves in Swiss bunker

Tether is continuing to add to its gold reserves, buying around one to two tonnes per week and lifting its total holdings to about 140 tonnes, worth roughly $24 billion.

The stablecoin issuer’s chief executive Paolo Ardoino said the firm intends to keep purchasing gold at the current pace for at least the next few months as prices hit record highs.

“We are soon becoming basically one of the biggest, let’s say, gold central banks in the world,”

Ardoino said.

Much of Tether’s gold is used for reserves and to back its gold-linked stablecoin XAUT, which has grown rapidly and recently entered the top 50 cryptocurrencies by market capitalisation.

The gold is stored in a high-security vault in Switzerland that was once a nuclear bunker, with Ardoino describing the facility as “a James Bond kind of place”.

Gold prices have surged above $5,000 an ounce, increasing the value of the bunker’s contents as Tether reviews its future buying plans on a quarterly basis.

According to a September attestation from BDO Italia, Tether’s precious metal reserves were worth about $12.9 billion at the time, accounting for roughly 7% of its stablecoin backing.