Tether swaps 2 Billion TRC-20 USDT to Ethereum

For the first time in 2021, the company behind the largest US-dollar backed stablecoin, Tether Inc., has swapped a significant amount of USDT supply from Tron blockchain (as TRC-20 token) to Ethereum (as ERC-20 token). This move from Tether is no longer a new thing in the cryptocurrency space, as they did a similar swap last year. The development usually happens when there’s a huge demand for the stablecoin on Ethereum.

Tether moves Tron USDT to Ethereum

Following the announcement on Twitter by Paolo Ardoino, the chief technology officer at Tether Inc., two billion USDT (~US$2 billion) was converted from the Tron blockchain to Ethereum. The swap was completed in five different transactions as Ardoino noted, which was also confirmed by Whale Alert, a dedicated crypto transaction tracker. Noteworthily, the process of swapping to Ethereum ensures that the total circulating supply of USDT doesn’t increase or reduce.

However, Ethereum USDT supply will increase in this case by exactly two billion USDT, while Tron’s supply will decrease by two billion USDT. The development today is coming about five days after Justin Sun, the CEO of Tron, celebrated a total supply of 10 billion USDT issued by Tether on their blockchain network.

Ethereum Remains the top Network for USDT

According to Tronscan, the network explorer for Tron blockchain, there are currently 8.6 billion USDT issued on Tron, all of which are currently in circulation, and held in about 1,815,892 addresses. Also, a further glance at Etherscan confirmed a total supply of 17.9 billion USDTs on Ethereum. These USDTs on Ethereum are held in over 2.4 million addresses.

Over the years, Ethereum has since remained the biggest network for USDT, followed by Tron and other blockchain networks.