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Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino says the company could consider more presence in the United States but is remaining cautious as it waits to see how the regulatory landscape changes.
“I cannot exclude Tether moving a bit more toward some US presence, but we are also doing that in a cautious way,” Ardoino said in an interview with Bloomberg TV on Jan. 16.
“For the moment, we need regulatory clarity and guidance. We need to see what the laws are looking like coming from the US, and then we will decide,” he added.
The prospect of an improved regulatory landscape for crypto companies in the US would be good news for Tether and companies like it.
It is “a great opportunity to start looking at the US environment and how it will change,” said Ardoino.
It comes as President-elect Donald Trump is expected to sign an executive order designating crypto as a national priority soon after his inauguration on Jan. 20.
In October, Ardoino told an audience at the DC Fintech Week that “there’s no place like the US” that has been leading technological development in “every single field,” but he also pointed out that crypto regulations have lagged.
“This is the first time in history that I see the US dropping the ball,” he said.
Paolo Ardoino speaking on Bloomberg TV. Source: Bloomberg
Ardoino’s comments came just days after Tether announced that it was moving its operations from the British Virgin Islands to El Salvador, following it being granted a digital asset service provider license by the Bitcoin-friendly Latin American nation on Jan. 13.
“The digital assets licensing framework in El Salvador is very comprehensive and the application process is thorough. Same for the stablecoin one,” commented Ardoino on X before adding, “It should be taken as an example by the rest of the world.”
Big profits predicted
Tether is also likely to beat its previous forecast of $10 billion in profit for 2024 by “quite a bit more,” said Ardoino.
Tether posted $2.5 billion in third-quarter profit, bringing the total to $7.7 billion at the end of September.
Additionally, Tether’s highly profitable US Treasury holdings have been managed by Cantor Fitzgerald since 2021 and the firm’s chief executive, Howard Lutnick, is set to serve in Trump’s next administration as secretary of commerce.
Related: Tether files lawsuit against Swan Bitcoin over joint venture dispute
In December, Tether announced a $775 million strategic investment with video sharing platform Rumble.
“So many 180-degree turnarounds in big tech. Now freedom of speech is cool again. Few always believed it. Grateful to be invested in Rumble,” said Ardiono on X on Jan. 17.
Tether’s stablecoin (USDT) has a market capitalization of $137 billion, which gives it a commanding market share of 64%, according to CoinGecko.
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