The Top 5 Stablecoins by market capitalization are: USDT, USDC, USDS, DAI, and USD1 by market cap.
USDT by Tether
USDT stands for US Dollar Tether is the largest stablecoin in the crypto markets. It first debuted in 2013 by the name of Real Coin on the BItcoin Blockchain but soon pivoted to Ethereum as an ERC-20 token because of the latter’s growing demand for DeFi.
The cryptocurrency commands a global market cap of more than $180 billion and exists primarly on the Ethereum and the Tron blockchain, besides other chains like Base, BNB, and others.
Despite being the largest stablecoin, USDT remains in controversy because of its unwillingness to get audited by thrid parties. Instead, Tether publishes reserves data on its website.
USDT stablecoins are backed by a mix of assets such as US Treasury Bonds, Cash, Debt Assets, Gold and others.
USDC by Circle
USDC is the second largest stablecoin issued by Circle. It has a market cap of more than $75 billion.
Until 2023 when the Silicon Valley Bank Collapse, it used to be in tough competition with USDT with almost similar market cap. However, the collapse caused its $3 billion in reserves to get frozen temporarily. Fearing dep-peg, users began to switch to USDT enmasse, causing it to fall to a distant second. The money was recovered later after USDC’s market cap fell significantly from $44 billion in March 2023 to $24 billion in November 2023.
Most of the USDC reserves are built of the US Dollar and Dollar Equivalents such as US Treasury Bonds, US Dollar-based debt assets, and forex.
USDS (formerly DAI) by Sky Protocol (formerly MakerDAO)
USDC is a newer version of the decentralized stablecoin DAI, issued by Sky Protocol which was formerly known as MakerDAO.
The stablecoin has 1:1 peg with MakerDAO and is backed by cryptocurrencies as well as US Treasury assets like Government Bonds.
I have not included DAI because at present DAI users are redeeming it for USDS. Upon completion, the stablecoin is expected to command a market cap of $15 billion.
USD1 by World Liberty Financial
USD1 named after Donald Trump (President and hence, the First Citizen of the US) is a stablecoin issued by World Liberty Financial, a company co-founded by his son Eric Trump.
It commands a market cap of more than $4 billion.
USDG (Global Dollar) by Paxos
USDG or the Global Dollar is a stablecoin issued by Paxos. It commands a market cap of more than $3.25 billion.
Paxos was previously the issuer of BUSD, BNB’s stablecoin but due to regulatory issues had to shut it down. Since then BNB has launched its own cryptocurrency called the $U or Unity Dollar.
Disclaimer: Stablecoin News provides information for
