4 ms·

Watch the sell orders rack up in real time: https://ftx.com/trade/USDT/USD https://ftx.com/trade/USDT/USD

russellbeattie 4y ago
That's a great link! The numbers are absolutely mind boggling to me. I just still can't believe how much money is involved in this completely unregulated market.
eterm 4y ago
In times like this I miss the trollbox.
- jcbrand 4y ago
  Cryptowatch has a trollbox right next to their charts. https://cryptowat.ch/charts/KRAKEN:USDT-USD?period=1h https://cryptowat.ch/charts/KRAKEN:USDT-USD?period=1h Click the chat icon (under the bell icon) on the rightmost sidebar to open it up.
vishnugupta 4y ago
Note that while it's a good proxy this isn't same as going to the issuer (https://tether.to https://tether.to) and getting 1USD in exchange for 1USDT. Tether is still honouring 1-1 conversion for a minimum of $100K.
- ThePhysicist 4y ago
  In my understanding that process takes several days at least and the reimbursement is done at the leisure of Tether, so I'd wager a lot of panicked investors won't take the official redemption route (that only works for large sums as well) and try to sell on the market instead. Hard to say if Tether will still honor the redemption if the price falls below 0.50 USD, as they likely don't have enough reserves on hand and from their transparency report is seems that more than 50 % of their reserves are tied up in commercial paper (Chinese real estate some speculate), which should be quite hard to liquidate in the current market environment.
  - Panzer04 4y ago
    If the price continues to fall and they can keep arbitraging, they could easily do quite well out of this (assuming they have a reasonable amount of reserves).
    - ThePhysicist 4y ago
      Yes, if they can make good on their promise (which I'm very doubtful about). Large holders of Tether have only downside risk now and speculators don't have much to win, so the market should mostly exert heavy downward pressure on Tether. I guess it comes down to whether the large exchanges will be willing to bail them out, which they might just do as Tether is too big to fail and no one wants the crypto party to end yet.
      - t0mas88 4y ago
        Every USDT they buy below 1 USD will increase their "backing level". So if they only stole let's say 5% of the funds to buy cars and boats, a price drop could slowly move them back to 100% backed. Assuming they have all the USD somewhere, but locked in all kinds of instruments (bonds etc) they would not be able to pay out without rapidly increasing wait times. And that will drop the price more and more because it increases doubts on whether they really have the USD. That drop further incentivizes them to use the USD that they do have quick access to to buy USDT on the market instead of pay-out their 1:1 redemption option. Which will increase the wait time even more and thus drop the price even further as USDT holders get spooked. But in most of those scenarios the guys behind Thether will make a lot of money.
  - quickthrower2 4y ago
    One trick up their sleeve could be get Bitfinex to print USD balances to buy the tether. Sellers of tether on the exchange go through “waiting period to withdraw their funds” (because the USD doesn’t exist!). That’ll keep the music going for an extra song.
- tsimionescu 4y ago
  Per another comment in this thread, that is only accessible to "verified Tether customers", which means you payed them directly for the USDT. If you bought it off Coinbase for some ETH, you don't have any right to recoup it from them (though presumably Coinbase or whoever sold it to them does). Also, they reserve the right to delay fulfilling your order indefinitely, so they don't actually guarantee anything even if you did buy directly from them.
  - vishnugupta 4y ago
    > you don't have any right to recoup it from them You can transfer it from exchange to your own Wallet and then sell it back to Tether. Though you need at least $100K worth of USDT and you need to pay transfer fee to the exchange. It's bit of a hassle (and costs money) but can be done.
ThePhysicist 4y ago
Interesting, from watching the feed it seems most BUY orders are in the range of 100-1000 USD (i.e. small investors) whereas there are some really large SELL orders in the range of 100.000-1.000.000 USD. My naive take would be that crypto enthusiasts still believe in Tether whereas larger investors leave the ship. I mean it makes sense, if you have many millions invested in Tether you're probably better off selling now at a 2 % loss than hoping it will go back to 1 USD. Downside risk is much larger than upside potential as Tether will never go above 1 USD, so rationally it makes sense to withdraw all your fund from the coin as soon as even a small instability occurs. On the other hand it's mostly exchanges that hold Tether if I understand correctly, and those have a strong incentive to keep the system afloat so they shouldn't sell, though not selling will increase their risk as more and more of their customers offload their Tethers. Hard to say who will win in the end, but I guess we might find out how many USD reserves Tether actually holds.
- csomar 4y ago
  Given that markets are ripe with bots and aggregators, it's hard to say. The big money could be small investors, and the small money could be big one. It's impossible to tell without insider knowledge.
- graeme 4y ago
  Some speculation this is a short at work. You’d expect larger sales in that case no?
mhitza 4y ago
Pretty cool website. Fun to watch in realtime how the market slowly chipped away a 10 mil Tether buy order at 0.983. And now another order of the same size at 0.982.

That's a great link! The numbers are absolutely mind boggling to me. I just still can't believe how much money is involved in this completely unregulated market.

eterm 4y ago

In times like this I miss the trollbox.

jcbrand 4y ago
Cryptowatch has a trollbox right next to their charts. https://cryptowat.ch/charts/KRAKEN:USDT-USD?period=1h https://cryptowat.ch/charts/KRAKEN:USDT-USD?period=1h Click the chat icon (under the bell icon) on the rightmost sidebar to open it up.

vishnugupta 4y ago

Note that while it's a good proxy this isn't same as going to the issuer (https://tether.to https://tether.to) and getting 1USD in exchange for 1USDT. Tether is still honouring 1-1 conversion for a minimum of $100K.

ThePhysicist 4y ago
In my understanding that process takes several days at least and the reimbursement is done at the leisure of Tether, so I'd wager a lot of panicked investors won't take the official redemption route (that only works for large sums as well) and try to sell on the market instead. Hard to say if Tether will still honor the redemption if the price falls below 0.50 USD, as they likely don't have enough reserves on hand and from their transparency report is seems that more than 50 % of their reserves are tied up in commercial paper (Chinese real estate some speculate), which should be quite hard to liquidate in the current market environment.
- Panzer04 4y ago
  If the price continues to fall and they can keep arbitraging, they could easily do quite well out of this (assuming they have a reasonable amount of reserves).
  - ThePhysicist 4y ago
    Yes, if they can make good on their promise (which I'm very doubtful about). Large holders of Tether have only downside risk now and speculators don't have much to win, so the market should mostly exert heavy downward pressure on Tether. I guess it comes down to whether the large exchanges will be willing to bail them out, which they might just do as Tether is too big to fail and no one wants the crypto party to end yet.
    - t0mas88 4y ago
      Every USDT they buy below 1 USD will increase their "backing level". So if they only stole let's say 5% of the funds to buy cars and boats, a price drop could slowly move them back to 100% backed. Assuming they have all the USD somewhere, but locked in all kinds of instruments (bonds etc) they would not be able to pay out without rapidly increasing wait times. And that will drop the price more and more because it increases doubts on whether they really have the USD. That drop further incentivizes them to use the USD that they do have quick access to to buy USDT on the market instead of pay-out their 1:1 redemption option. Which will increase the wait time even more and thus drop the price even further as USDT holders get spooked. But in most of those scenarios the guys behind Thether will make a lot of money.
- quickthrower2 4y ago
  One trick up their sleeve could be get Bitfinex to print USD balances to buy the tether. Sellers of tether on the exchange go through “waiting period to withdraw their funds” (because the USD doesn’t exist!). That’ll keep the music going for an extra song.
tsimionescu 4y ago
Per another comment in this thread, that is only accessible to "verified Tether customers", which means you payed them directly for the USDT. If you bought it off Coinbase for some ETH, you don't have any right to recoup it from them (though presumably Coinbase or whoever sold it to them does). Also, they reserve the right to delay fulfilling your order indefinitely, so they don't actually guarantee anything even if you did buy directly from them.
- vishnugupta 4y ago
  > you don't have any right to recoup it from them You can transfer it from exchange to your own Wallet and then sell it back to Tether. Though you need at least $100K worth of USDT and you need to pay transfer fee to the exchange. It's bit of a hassle (and costs money) but can be done.

ThePhysicist 4y ago

Interesting, from watching the feed it seems most BUY orders are in the range of 100-1000 USD (i.e. small investors) whereas there are some really large SELL orders in the range of 100.000-1.000.000 USD. My naive take would be that crypto enthusiasts still believe in Tether whereas larger investors leave the ship. I mean it makes sense, if you have many millions invested in Tether you're probably better off selling now at a 2 % loss than hoping it will go back to 1 USD. Downside risk is much larger than upside potential as Tether will never go above 1 USD, so rationally it makes sense to withdraw all your fund from the coin as soon as even a small instability occurs. On the other hand it's mostly exchanges that hold Tether if I understand correctly, and those have a strong incentive to keep the system afloat so they shouldn't sell, though not selling will increase their risk as more and more of their customers offload their Tethers. Hard to say who will win in the end, but I guess we might find out how many USD reserves Tether actually holds.

csomar 4y ago
Given that markets are ripe with bots and aggregators, it's hard to say. The big money could be small investors, and the small money could be big one. It's impossible to tell without insider knowledge.
graeme 4y ago
Some speculation this is a short at work. You’d expect larger sales in that case no?

mhitza 4y ago

Pretty cool website. Fun to watch in realtime how the market slowly chipped away a 10 mil Tether buy order at 0.983. And now another order of the same size at 0.982.