Tether to Launch Chinese Yuan-Pegged Stablecoin ‘CNHT’
Tether Limited, the creators of Tether (USDT), the largest stablecoin on the market and seventh-largest cryptocurrency in the world by market capitalization, has announced plans to launch CNHT, a stablecoin the highly controversial firm claims will be backed by offshore Chinese yuan, according to reports on August 21, 2019.
Tether Developing CNHT Stablecoin
Per sources close to the matter, Tether is making plans to issue a new stablecoin named CNHT, which will be backed by offshore Chinese yuan (CNH).
For the uninitiated, there are basically two kinds of Chinese Yuan: offshore (CNH) and onshore (CNY).
While onshore yuan trading is under the control of China’s apex bank, the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), offshore yuan is traded freely on foreign currency markets, and both the onshore and offshore yuan have separate rates.
Reportedly, the news was revealed to a local news source, Chainews by Bitfinex shareholder, Zhao Dong, who also hinted that his firm RenrenBit will be the first to invest in the yuan-pegged stablecoin before it gets introduced to the public in the coming months.
Tether’s Unending Controversies
While Tether (USDT) holds the record of being the first stablecoin to launched in the cryptospace and it still occupies the largest market share, Tether remains one of the most controversial projects in the cryptoverse.
In November 2018, reports emerged that the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) had launched a joint criminal probe aimed at finding out whether Tether and Bitfinex are guilty of bitcoin price manipulation.
Fast forward to March 2019 and Tether, which previously claimed that the entire USDT in circulation was pegged at 1:1 with the U.S. dollar, updated its terms and conditions, implying that its reserves also contains other assets asides the dollar.
As reported by BTCManager earlier in April 2019, the New York Attorney General (NYAG) Office published a document accusing Bitfinex and Tether of misappropriating clients’ funds to cover up massive business losses amounting to $850 million.
At the time, NYAG representative, Letitia James announced that she had obtained a court order against iFinex, the parent firm of Tether and Bitfinex exchange, for defrauding New York residents and going against the statutes of the state.
More recently, in May 2019, crypto enthusiasts and stakeholders in the cryptoverse urged established crypto exchanges to delist Tether (USDT) due to the unending controversies associated with the stablecoin.
