Tether, the issuer of the world's largest stablecoin, acquired approximately 6 metric tons of gold for its reserves in the first quarter,
down from 27 tons in the October-December period, according to a quarterly report published on Friday.
The cryptocurrency company's reserves backing Tether USDT contained $19.8 billion worth of gold as of March 31, equivalent to approximately 132 metric tons at the market price at that time, down from 126 tons at the end of December.
Tether has $189.5 billion worth of USDT tokens in circulation and $3.3 billion worth of Tether XAUT gold tokens. Each dollar token represents one U.S. dollar held in reserve, and the company holds assets of equivalent value when users provide dollars in exchange for USDT.
The reserves backing Tether USDT consist primarily of $117 billion in US Treasury bills, with gold accounting for 10% as of March 31. Bitcoin represented $7 billion in reserves.
For Tether's gold-backed token, XAUT, which is fully backed by gold, separate data showed that Tether holds 22 tonnes of gold, an increase of 6 tonnes since December 31.
In total, Tether holds 154 tonnes of gold for its two products. If the company were a central bank, it would be among the top 20 countries by gold reserves, behind Brazil, which holds 172 tonnes, according to the World Gold Council.