History of Tether’s peg: Every time USDT traded above or below one dollar

—, ,
—by Protos Staff
 Listen to this article. 

Tether (USDT) is the world’s largest stablecoin. Commanding a $72 billion market capitalization, Tether’s peg has mostly remained $1 since its founding in October 2014. Tethers are backed by an assortment of assets, and certain customers are allowed to redeem Tethers for small amounts of actual dollars.

Users of Tether enjoy its low volatility, ease of use, and relatively stable reference price. Around the world, crypto exchanges report tens of billions of dollars worth of Tether-denominated crypto transactions every day.

Despite its attempt to maintain a $1 price at all times, sometimes liquidity cascades. The price of USDT has traded in a wide range since its founding. Tether’s peg once broke to $0.001 and once blew out any short-sellers’ positions as it skyrocketed to $1,000.

Below is a timeline of all major instances when Tether’s peg failed to maintain $1.

Note: crypto exchanges do not provide detailed time and sales for historical transactions. Many only summarize each trading day’s open, high, low, close, and volume ⏤ consolidated every 24 hours. Nevertheless, below is an event history of the times when one tether was not worth one dollar.

Timeline of Tether’s peg

Here’s a history of when Tether failed to remain at $1 — both above and below. Note: amount cleared on trading day was not necessarily all at the price mentioned, but reflects entire dollar sum cleared in those 24 hours.

  • On December 30, 2017, USDT traded at $10 per USD on EXMO. On that day, $213,000 dollars cleared on EXMO’s USDT/USD trading pair.
  • The next time it de-pegged was on October 15, 2018, when USDT traded at $0.87 per USD on Bittrex. On that day, $3 million dollars cleared on Bittrex’s USDT/USD trading pair.
  • On October 15, 2018, USDT traded at $0.51 per USD Coin (USDC) on Poloniex. $2 million dollars cleared on Poloniex’s USDT/USDC trading pair that day.
  • On January 22, 2019, it traded at $0.001 per USD on OKCoin with $120,000 dollars cleared.
  • Tether traded at $1,000 per USD on Kraken on May 11, 2019. $6 million dollars cleared on Kraken’s USDT/USD trading pair that day.
  • More than a year later, on February 19, 2020, USDT traded at $4.99 per USD on Binance.US — $2 million dollars was cleared on Binance.US’ USDT/USD trading pair in that 24 hour period.
  • On March 13, 2020, USDT traded at $1.15 per USD on Bittrex. On that day, $3 million dollars cleared on Bittrex’s USDT/USD trading pair.
  • That same day, USDT traded at $1.05 per USD on FTX. $12 million dollars cleared on FTX’s USDT/USD trading pair.
Listen: Tether CTO Paolo Ardoino told hedge funder George Noble existing regulations mean the company does not need to release full disclosure of its assets.

Read more: Turns out this tiny Bahamas bank is holding some of Tether’s reserves

  • On April 30, 2020, USDT traded at $0.96 per USD on FTX. On that day, $4 million dollars cleared on FTX’s USDT/USD trading pair.
  • On December 16, 2020, USDT traded at $0.93 per USD on OKCoin — $10 million dollars cleared on OKCoin’s USDT/USD trading pair in that 24 hour window.
  • Five months later, on May 19, 2021, USDT traded at $1.10 per USD on Bitstamp. On that day, $150 million dollars cleared on that trading pair.
  • On December 15 that year, USDT traded at $9 per USD on Bitstamp. $4 million dollars cleared on Bitstamp’s USDT/USD trading pair.
  • On May 12, 2022, USDT traded at $0.92 per USD on Kraken. On that day, $1 billion dollars cleared on Kraken’s USDT/USD trading pair.
  • That same day, it traded at $0.95 per USD on Binance.US — $340 million dollars cleared on Binance.US’ USDT/USD trading pair that day.
  • USDT traded at $0.57 per USD on Bittrex on May 12, 2022. On that day, $10 million dollars cleared on Bittrex’s USDT/USD trading pair.
  • On June 6, 2022, USDT traded at $0.18 per USD Coin (USDC) on ValleySwap. On that day, $7 million dollars cleared on its USDT/USDC trading pair.

Protos has published authoritative chronologies of Tether since inception. Our journalists have published 135 stories on the stablecoin. We conduct primary analysis and in-depth investigations into its operations, naming individuals involved in its global operations.

As Tether deals with regulators, short-sellers, and adversarial market participants, we will continue covering its escapades and efforts to retain Tether’s peg.

For more informed news, follow us on Twitter and Google News or listen to our investigative podcast Innovated: Blockchain City.