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Is Thether a scam?

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Goojybooboo
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Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 7:36 am

A simple question. But I am sure there are no simple answers.
Thank you anyway.
atilla9
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 7:48 am

I'm asking the same question. But as you said, there are no simple answers.

I would not keep Tether for the long term. I think USDC is a better choice. USDC has regular audits, while Tether is a mess in those terms.
cortomaltese
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 9:03 am

USDC is far more complied than USDT as already said is passing regular audits , however is (like tether) a centralised currency.
there are other decentralised options with most reliable and battletested the DAI currency.
Alfa1234
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 10:17 am

There is also BUSD and PAX, both are regulated and have audited, proven results that every crypto coin they issue is backed by a real dollar. 

Thether is claiming the same but there are many issues with it, although I seriously doubt they are a scam and they give circumstantial evidence their coins are also backed by a USD for every coin they issue.  The main issue with thether is they cannot find a big audit company that is wiling to take the case because none of them seem to want to get burned due to the unregulated crypto sphere.  In the end it's a trust game, as long as the market trusts Thether's ability to honour all withthrawals, it's all good. 

You should take into account there are some big players that would not allow Thether to go down as it would send shockwaves through the entire crypto world and most if not all coins would crash along with it.  For it to crash, a very large percentae of all coins issued would have to be sold at the same time back to Thether AND they would not have to be able to honour those buybacks. The coins would not just have to be sold on exchanges as  some players would take advantage of any price discrepancy and buy or sell those thether coins back to Thether. As long as some big players would have faith in the system, it would be ok as they would support the coin by buying it once it hits 0.98 USD on exchanges,( or whatever price they deem profitable).

Holding it to do transactions or for smaller amounts of time should be no issue, although I wouldn't change my fiat into it to hold long term.

Keep in mind, banks don't even have to hold a fraction of the amount of money they are holding on paper in reserve, so in a way Thether is much more crash-proof if you look at it that way, although banks do have the government and central banks to back them up in case of a bank run.
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 12:44 pm

I will agree with Alfa1234. Tether is not a scam! Yes, they haven't done the best job to build very good trust. The issues that they were having has mainly to do with regulations on US. It is not possible for them to have a US bank account in order to serve their customers. They used to work with HSBC and once they have said that in public, the next day HSBC closed their account. No bank or big audit firm wants to play his head for Tether. Their risks are greater than their rewards. Tether was also unlucky because one bank that they were using was accused for money laundering that had nothing to do with Tether itself, but the ball hit them too. Of course it would be foolish to hold Tether for long term, it was not created to be used for long term hold but for a transfer mechanism from fiat system to crypto system. It is used mainly from people that have not access to US bank accounts. For example, Chinese, Russians,Brazilians basically the biggest part of the world doesn't have access to the internal US banking system. So, they send money to the Tether bank account which can accept all these international USD, in order to have access to the crypto space. Tether wants their operation to be as private as possible in order to protect the bank that they are using. They try to give to the public the least amount of evidence in order to prove that they are not a scam and they have the USD that they claim they have. As Alfa1234 said, it is a matter of trust.
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 1:20 pm

I personally find it absolutely ridiculous one needs to "trust" something that's so enormous in size. I'm pretty sure it is a scam, but one that might keep on going for a long time.  Or it might be done tomorrow. Bernie Madoff went on for years and years, until one day it was all over. Same for Enron, etc, etc, etc. Tether will just be another name in a long list.

This is a pretty good read: https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.co ... dcf78a64d3
Last edited by vinciguerra on Thu Jan 21, 2021 1:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
makarid
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 2:28 pm

vinciguerra wrote: I personally find it absolutely ridiculous one needs to "trust" something that's so enormous in size. I'm pretty sure it is a scam, but one that might keep on going for a long time.  Or it might be done tomorrow. Bernie Madoff went on for years and years, until one day it was all over. Same for Enron, etc, etc, etc. Tether will just be another name in a long list.

This is a pretty good read: https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.co ... dcf78a64d3
I find his post very poor of data. He is an anonymous American, that he finds out that other people in the world do not use US banking system for depositing funds to crypto currencies in order to use leverage products. It is getting ridiculous, because something doesn't comply with the US laws doesn't mean that it is a scam or whatever. His post is based on the assumption that anything outside US is a scam and a fad. Probably he doesn't know that most of the people in the world do not have bank account that accepts USD
Last edited by makarid on Thu Jan 21, 2021 2:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 3:17 pm

So far, instead of exchange crypto to fiat i used Tether so as to avoid bank transactions.

All you guys that avoid Tether, you simply cash out to fiat? Was your bank ok with that?
vinciguerra
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 3:20 pm

ilovethisforum wrote:
vinciguerra wrote: I personally find it absolutely ridiculous one needs to "trust" something that's so enormous in size. I'm pretty sure it is a scam, but one that might keep on going for a long time.  Or it might be done tomorrow. Bernie Madoff went on for years and years, until one day it was all over. Same for Enron, etc, etc, etc. Tether will just be another name in a long list.

This is a pretty good read: https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.co ... dcf78a64d3

I find his post very poor of data. He is an anonymous American, that he finds out that other people in the world do not use US banking system for depositing funds to crypto currencies in order to use leverage products. It is getting ridiculous, because something doesn't comply with the US laws doesn't mean that it is a scam or whatever. His post is based on the assumption that anything outside US is a scam and a fad. Probably he doesn't know that most of the people in the world do not have bank account that accepts USD

Sure, if you really believe there's 25.000.000.000 USD in a bank account in the Bahama's somewhere, all is fine I guess.
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 3:23 pm

apoel81 wrote: So far, instead of exchange crypto to fiat i used Tether so as to avoid bank transactions.

All you guys that avoid Tether, you simply cash out to fiat? Was your bank ok with that?
I got called into a bank branch years (five?) ago. I explained what I was doing and after that they left me alone. Half the world is trading bitcoin now, I can't imagine banks still care uniless you're transfering very large amounts.
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 5:12 pm

Yes, it is a massive scam and therefore an equally large liability in holding it.

In 2017 and 2018, there was a guy that sounded the trumpet, went by the handle of Bitfinexed, search for his findings at the time.

As a very brief summary for that period, at one time interval, the tether operation was completely unbanked, they could barely find a half-legitimate firm to audit them, and public tracking of tether treasury, bitfinex (same people), poloniex and other major exchanges gave hints to price manipulation and significant wash trading.

The simple state of affairs is that stablecoins (pegged assets) are quite distinct from Bitcoin et al. in the sense that they represent, in equal measure, the asset they are pegged to. The equal measure part of the sentence does not require trust, it can be resolved by "first-grade" counting. One may trust that the equality is there accross time, out of practicality, in order not to count all the time.

Do recall when more than half of the world stock of gold was in US possession, some 50 years ago, and the dollar was pegged to it, there came a moment in 1971 when Nixon made a speech and it did not went very well after it.

Personally, I've always been wary of exchanges that don't offer actual fiat IOUs, but only stablecoins as a means of exit.

I do hold usdc currently, as a somewhat better alternative.
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 5:38 pm

vinciguerra wrote: I personally find it absolutely ridiculous one needs to "trust" something that's so enormous in size. I'm pretty sure it is a scam, but one that might keep on going for a long time.  Or it might be done tomorrow. Bernie Madoff went on for years and years, until one day it was all over. Same for Enron, etc, etc, etc. Tether will just be another name in a long list.

This is a pretty good read: https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.co ... dcf78a64d3
Trust something so enormous in size?  If tomorrow the world lost "trust" in the euro and everybody sold them at once, what do you think would happen to your fiat money? The entire economic system is based on trust.  You're pretty sure it is a scam, but this is not based upon evidence, only your gut.
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 5:56 pm

apoel81 wrote: So far, instead of exchange crypto to fiat i used Tether so as to avoid bank transactions.

All you guys that avoid Tether, you simply cash out to fiat? Was your bank ok with that?
Better use USDC,BUSD,TUSD or the best option imo DAI
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 7:03 pm

To what extend do yo think the Tether case is moving the cyryptomarkets down? We are already some 33% down from the tops and the dates of the case correlate very well.
vinciguerra
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Re: Is Thether a scam?

Thu Jan 21, 2021 7:31 pm

Alfa1234 wrote:
vinciguerra wrote: I personally find it absolutely ridiculous one needs to "trust" something that's so enormous in size. I'm pretty sure it is a scam, but one that might keep on going for a long time.  Or it might be done tomorrow. Bernie Madoff went on for years and years, until one day it was all over. Same for Enron, etc, etc, etc. Tether will just be another name in a long list.

This is a pretty good read: https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.co ... dcf78a64d3
Trust something so enormous in size?  If tomorrow the world lost "trust" in the euro and everybody sold them at once, what do you think would happen to your fiat money? The entire economic system is based on trust.  You're pretty sure it is a scam, but this is not based upon evidence, only your gut.
Definitely. But everybody (or almost everybody) does trust fiat money and uses fiat money in day to day life.  Fiat money is backed by virtually nothing but trust.

Tether on the other hand is trusted by almost nobody, at least almost nobody who does a tiny bit of research. That's why they need to make their claim tether is backed by something that people do trust. If that's all a lie, there's nothing there.

You really believe I should provide evidence it's a scam?  That's an opinion I guess. It's my opinion on the other hand it makes more sense for Tether to provide evidence where they are holding the supposed 25 billion, not me.

But anyway, I don't care either way. I just can't understand why anybody would risk holding the bag on something so obviously dodgy.
Last edited by vinciguerra on Thu Jan 21, 2021 7:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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