Paolo Ardoino, the Chief Technical Officer at the Bitfinex cryptocurrency exchange, has requested users in a tweet that they should learn a difference between Tether (USDT) and Bitcoin (BTC). He clarified in the tweet that the US Dollar-pegged Tether is not Bitcoin rather it is a centralized stablecoin and people should need to know this.
Tether is not Bitcoin
Bitcoin (BTC) is the world’s largest decentralized cryptocurrency by market capitalization. While on the other hand, the CTO of Tether as well as the Bitfinex exchange Paolo Ardoino has clearly said in a tweet that USDT is a centralized stablecoin that serves as a better transport layer for fiat currency on chain. He said that Users need to learn the difference between these two assets. His tweet reads:
“#Tether is not #Bitcoin. Please learn the difference. Tether is a centralised stablecoin that serves as a better and faster transport layer for fiat on chain. Being centralised is also subject to regulatory requirements.”
These remarks from the Bitfinex CTO have come after some cryptocurrency enthusiasts in the community have raised concerns regarding the decision of freezing an amount of $33 million USDT from the crypto exchange KuCoin hack.
However, Paolo Ardoino has defended this action of freezing millions of Tether (USDT) very well. He said that as a centralized stablecoin, Tether also has got duties towards law enforcement, regulators, and users. “We have anyway strict rules and parameters for action. We won’t slip outside those”, he added further.
And those who are complaining about the action of freezing of stolen funds by centralized stablecoins they are actually not the ones who have lost their funds, he said:
“People that complain about centralised stablecoins freezing stolen funds are doing so just because they are not part of who lost funds. Once happens to them usually they start whining without an end (happened few times). Too easy when it happens to someone else.”