Tether is rising to be one of the world's most aggressive gold buyers, challenging and even surpassing central banks in part.
The crypto company is gradually converting stablecoin profits into physical gold on a sovereign scale.
Central banks are no longer the largest buyers as Tether converts stablecoin earnings into sovereign-scale gold.
Already in the fourth quarter of 2025, the stablecoin issuer announced that it had added about 27 tons of gold to its reserves. This pace makes Tether one of the top buyers globally for the season.
Tetherin Q4 purchases largely matched its Q3 purchases, which analysts estimated to be around 26 tons. At the end of November, BeInCrypto reported that Tether bought more than any central bank, accumulating 116 tons of gold in 2025.
While final data from central banks is still pending, Bitwise’s chief investment officer Matt Hougan noted that the company is likely to be among the top three buyers for that quarter.
“Who is the central bank now? Tether officially bought more gold than any central bank in the third quarter of 2025. The situation remains tight in the fourth quarter as well — final data is still awaited — but the company is in the top 3,” Hougan wrote on X.
The scale of purchases is particularly emphasized against the backdrop of a significant rise in gold prices. The spot price of gold rose 18% from the beginning of the year and 64% in 2025. At the same time, consecutive psychological thresholds of 3,000, 4,000, and 5,000 dollars per ounce were broken.
Tether's purchases, valued at around 4.4 billion dollars, have made it a significant source of additional demand in an already tight market.
Unlike state buyers, Tether's gold acquisition is not linked to monetary policy or the balance of payments.
The company finances its purchases mainly with the yields from USDT – a dollar-pegged stablecoin – leveraging interest-generating investments such as U.S. government bonds.
With a circulation value of approximately 187 billion dollars, this yield has become an effective driver of asset growth.
From a stablecoin issuer to a sovereign-scale gold holder
In practice, Tether has become a hybrid operator:
Partially a stablecoin issuer
Partially an asset manager and
Increasingly also a de facto gold accumulator.
Its Q3 reserves report indicated that the value of gold reserves was 12.9 billion dollars at the end of September — about 104 tons at that time. However, gold constituted only 7% of the backing assets of USDT; the majority of the reserves were made up of U.S. government bonds.
Tether's gold strategy is closely related to its tokenized gold XAUT product. According to the company, XAUT now accounts for about 60% of the global gold-backed stablecoin market, which grew from approximately 1.3 billion to over 4 billion dollars by 2025.
As of December 31, Tether owned 520,089 troy ounces of fine gold as collateral for XAUT at a strict 1:1 ratio. The reserves are kept in Swiss vaults that comply with London Good Delivery standards.
“We are now operating at a scale that places the Tether Gold Investment Fund alongside sovereign gold holders, bringing with it real responsibility,” Tether's CEO Paolo Ardoino stated in a press release.
He added that XAUT is designed to “eliminate uncertainty at a time when trust in monetary systems is weakening.”
For comparison, Poland's central bank — the official entity reporting the most active buying activity — added 35 tons of gold in Q4, raising its total reserves to 550 tons.
The fact that a private company is now operating at the same level indicates a broader shift. Stablecoins are becoming a new, structural source of gold demand alongside states and increasingly often as their competitor.
Now, the market is primarily wondering how much gold Tether will buy next. An even bigger question is what it means when private issuers of digital dollars begin to define monetary policy credibility on their own terms.