The hidden whale behind the surge in gold: Tether, which earns billions of dollars annually, has accumulated 140 tons of gold

Author: Nancy, PANews

Gold is going crazy. Less than a month into the new year, various funds are rushing to buy, and gold prices are repeatedly hitting record highs.

In this gold frenzy, an “invisible big player” unexpectedly enters the scene. The stablecoin giant Tether has quietly accumulated 140 tons of gold reserves.
Holding 140 tons of gold, aiming to become the world’s largest gold central bank.
“Tether, which has ‘mines’ at home,” is becoming a major player in the gold market.
“We will soon become one of the largest ‘gold central banks’ in the world,” said Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino in a recent Bloomberg interview, openly expressing his ambitions.
This is not just talk. To date, Tether has accumulated approximately 140 tons of physical gold, valued at about $23 billion at current prices. Usually, Tether purchases directly from Swiss refineries and top global financial institutions. Large metal orders often take months to deliver. Once received, the gold is stored in a nuclear bunker built during the Cold War in Switzerland, with multiple layers of heavy steel doors for protection, and Switzerland has a top-tier confidentiality system.
In terms of scale, Tether has become the largest known physical gold holder outside the banking system and governments, ranking among the top 30 gold holders worldwide, with holdings surpassing countries like Greece, Qatar, and Australia.
Although Tether began laying out gold assets years ago, the large-scale entry happened in 2025. Just last year, Tether bought over 70 tons of gold, making it one of the top three global gold buyers this year. Its procurement scale not only exceeds almost all individual central banks except the Polish central bank but also surpasses many large gold ETFs.
It can be said that Tether has been a significant driver behind this year’s gold price surge.

According to Ardoino, Tether’s gold procurement rate is currently about 1 to 2 tons per week, with plans to maintain this pace in the coming months. “Maybe it will slow down, but we will evaluate gold demand quarterly.”
But Tether’s ambitions go beyond just stockpiling gold. In the Bloomberg interview, Ardoino stated that Tether is evaluating market and potential trading strategies, planning to actively trade gold reserves to capture arbitrage opportunities. At the same time, the company is working on creating “the world’s best gold trading hall,” aiming to establish a stable, long-term gold acquisition channel and compete with major banks like JPMorgan Chase and HSBC, which dominate the global precious metals market.
To this end, Tether made a high-profile introduction of two heavyweight trading veterans last year: Vincent Domien, former Global Metals Trading Head at HSBC, and Mathew O’Neill, head of precious metals procurement for Europe, Middle East, and Africa, specifically to expand its gold business footprint.
In the upstream of the industry chain, Tether is also beginning to leverage its financial strength. Tether has invested in several Canadian mid-sized gold mining rights companies, including Elemental Royalty, Metalla Royalty & Streaming, Versamet Royalties, and Gold Royalty, through equity investments to lock in future production capacity and revenue sharing.
In terms of financial products, Tether launched the gold-pegged stablecoin Tether Gold (XAU₮) as early as 2020. By the end of last year, this token was backed by 16.2 tons of physical gold. Recently, Tether also introduced a new valuation unit for XAU₮ called Scudo, where 1 Scudo represents one-thousandth of a troy ounce of gold, making gold easier to use as a payment method.
Data from CoinGecko shows that as of January 28, the circulating market cap of XAU₮ has reached $2.7 billion, a growth of about 91.3% over the past year, holding a 49.5% market share in the tokenized gold sector, remaining the leader.

From physical gold accumulation, to industry chain layout, to financial product innovation, this big spender in gold has even been called “the most incomprehensible company” by traditional commodities insiders. Some describe Tether as “the strangest company encountered.”
But now, as gold prices continue to hit new highs, Tether’s bet is paying off astonishingly.
Annual profit of $15 billion, building a capital arsenal.
Tether’s confidence in its gold hoarding stems from a high-speed “money printing machine.”
According to Fortune, Tether generated about $15 billion in net profit in 2025, a significant increase from $13 billion the previous year. The global staff supporting this hundreds-of-millions-of-dollars profit is only about 200 people. Roughly calculated, the per capita profit is as high as $75 million, a level of efficiency that leaves traditional financial giants in the dust.
The core of this profit-making capability comes from the capital pool accumulated through its stablecoin business.
Today, Tether’s issued USDT, the US dollar stablecoin, is the most widely used stablecoin globally, with user numbers surpassing 500 million.
CoinGecko data shows that as of January 28, 2026, the circulating supply of USDT is close to $187 billion, maintaining the top position in the stablecoin sector.
Trading activity is also leading. Artemis Analytics data indicates that in 2025, total stablecoin trading volume grew by 72% to $33 trillion, with USDT contributing $13.3 trillion, accounting for over 33%.
Building on this foundation, Tether is further expanding its capital accumulation through compliance.
On January 27, Tether officially launched USAT, a federally regulated stablecoin in the US, issued by Anchorage Digital Bank, the first federally regulated stablecoin issuer in the US. Cantor Fitzgerald serves as the designated reserve custodian and preferred Tier 1 dealer. Former White House advisor Bo Hines was appointed CEO.
This move is seen as a key step for Tether to fully enter the US domestic market.
Meanwhile, Tether is leveraging investments in content platforms like Rumble to integrate USAT into the traffic ecosystem, aiming to reach 100 million US users and setting a target market cap of $1 trillion within five years. If successful, USAT could become the first real competitor to USDC in the US market.
After nearly zero-cost liabilities, Tether is also easily earning interest by allocating highly liquid, low-risk assets.
The interest from US Treasuries is Tether’s main revenue source. During high-interest-rate cycles, US Treasury interest directly amplifies Tether’s profitability. Currently, Tether holds about $135 billion in US Treasuries, surpassing countries like South Korea, making it the 17th largest US Treasury holder globally.
At the same time, Tether is also a major player in Bitcoin. Since 2023, Tether has allocated up to 15% of its monthly net profit to dollar-cost averaging into Bitcoin.
It now holds over 96,000 BTC, making it one of the largest institutional holders of Bitcoin, with an average cost of about $51,000, well below the current market price.
Around the Bitcoin ecosystem, Tether has also built mining farms, invested in mining companies, and laid out DAT (cryptocurrency treasury), continuously expanding its industry influence. There have even been conspiracy theories abroad about “BTC hidden manipulators.”
In addition, to unlock more potential profits, Tether has been investing in satellite communications, AI data centers, agriculture, telecommunications, and media over the past few years.
Thus, a cross-industry arbitrage machine spanning traditional finance and the crypto world has gradually taken shape, continuously providing Tether with capital ammunition for its big bets.