Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said during a talk at the Plan ₿ Forum in Lugano, Switzerland, that the company holds roughly 150,000 BTC worth about $11.5 billion. The amount is about 50,000 BTC higher than the bitcoin holdings calculated from Tether’s latest USDT reserves report.

“We ourselves have roughly 150,000 bitcoin. Not that much, but it’s honestly earned money,” Ardoino said.

Difference from reported reserves

According to Tether’s financial report, the company held $8.37 billion in bitcoin as of Sept. 30, 2026. At an estimated price of $83,621 per bitcoin, the position amounted to roughly 100,060 BTC. The difference from Ardoino’s figure is about 50,000 BTC, or $3.8 billion.

Ardoino did not say where the additional coins are held or when Tether acquired them. The company has previously said that Tether Investments’ proprietary investments are funded from profits and excess capital and accounted for separately from the reserves backing USDT.

The discrepancy therefore does not necessarily indicate that Tether made new purchases or that USDT lacks sufficient backing.

In May 2023, Tether announced plans to allocate up to 15% of its realized operating profit to regular purchases of bitcoin.

Users and infrastructure

Ardoino also discussed Tether’s expanding user base, saying more than 730 million people use the company’s services. He said the total is growing by about 30 million new wallets each quarter.

“Tether has become the biggest example of successful financial inclusion expansion in human history,” Ardoino said.

He said the pace of user growth is comparable to that of social networks and exceeds the trajectory of many traditional financial-technology companies.

Ardoino also said Tether and its partners have built one of the largest mining projects, with computing power exceeding 50 EH/s.

The company is developing its Independence Stack concept, a suite of open technologies covering energy infrastructure, mining, peer-to-peer communications, self-custody crypto wallets and local AI models.

“We want people to be independent. We want families to be independent. We want cities, towns, and communities to be independent,” Ardoino said.

According to Ardoino, the technologies should continue operating regardless of what happens to Tether in the future. He said the company aims to create open infrastructure that third-party developers and organizations can use.

Tether previously reported net operating profit of $1.5 billion for the third quarter of 2026. The USDT issuer reported total assets of $191.45 billion and liabilities of $183.5 billion, while excess reserves rose to $7.95 billion.

Source: Incrypted