USAT
US-regulated dollar stablecoin created by Tether and issued by Anchorage Digital Bank, a federally chartered US bank, under the GENIUS Act. Each USAT is redeemable one-to-one for US dollars and backed in full by liquid reserves. It launched on Ethereum in January 2026 and expanded to Celo in July 2026, where transaction fees can be paid directly in USAT. The token targets regulated US institutions and mobile-first stablecoin users in emerging markets.
A GENIUS Act dollar token done properly: full reserves, bank issuance, real distribution. As money it is the US dollar with extra rails - no independent unit of account, one-entity shutdown risk, and seigniorage kept by the issuer. Scores below RLUSD (2.6) on deeper bank embedding and a shorter track record.
M69 Score
Scored against the Money2069 Manifesto — see methodology. Higher = more aligned.
Detailed Rating Breakdown
Issuance Model3x3.0
Debt-free full-reserve issuance (IM-02 high): dollars in, tokens out, with user-initiated redemption burning supply (IM-05). But a single permissioned bank issuer (IM-01 low) and backing tied to fiat instruments, not real economic activity (IM-03 low). Nets out mid-band, matching the RLUSD calibration.
Spending Power Stability2x3.0
Hard 1:1 USD peg via full-reserve redemption, the same mechanism RLUSD scores 3 on. Benchmark is a single moderate-stability fiat (SPS-02 band 2) and the design conflates price stability with purchasing power (SPS-05 low); track record is under a year but the peg has held since the January 2026 launch.
Fiat Independence & Interoperability2x1.0
Fully borrowed unit of account (FI-01 band 1), 100% fiat reserves (FI-02 band 1), and the issuer IS a US national bank, so the protocol cannot exist without banking rails (FI-03 band 1). Deeper fiat embedding than RLUSD's 2; matches the EURAU floor.
Traction2x3.0
About $185M market cap seven months after launch, listings on Kraken, Crypto.com, Bybit and OKX, and a native Celo deployment (July 2026) with gas payable in USAT targeting Celo's mobile stablecoin users. Growing with strong partners (TR-07, TR-10 high) but young (TR-02 low) and never a unit of account beyond the dollar it mirrors (TR-05 low).
Sovereignty1.0
OCC-supervised single issuer with standard freeze and blacklist capability; one regulator or one bank decision can halt issuance and redemption (SO-01 band 1). Fully custodial reserve model; designed for state compliance rather than censorship resistance.
Governance2.0
Corporate governance by Anchorage Digital and Tether's US entity; no community process, no constitutional protection of monetary rules beyond the GENIUS Act's statutory reserve requirements, which do add disclosed external constraints (GO-03 partial).
Resilience2.0
Backed by two well-capitalized institutions and a statutory reserve regime, but it has survived no crisis (RE-01 band 1), depends entirely on US banking infrastructure, and a regulatory reversal is a single point of failure. Funding sustainability from reserve yield is strong (RE-07 high).
Inclusivity3.0
Freely transferable on open chains with no minimum balance, and the Celo deployment explicitly targets mobile-first emerging-market users (IN-03 mid). Primary mint/redeem is KYC-gated at the bank (IN-06 band 2) and reserve yield flows to the issuer, not holders (IN-04 band 2).