Stablecoin issuer Tether USDT +0.060% purchased another $627 million worth of bitcoins in the first quarter of 2024, bringing its total holdings to about 75,354 BTC -6.10% — worth over $5.2 billion. This marks the first time Tether's bitcoin holdings have surpassed the $5 billion mark, coinciding with bitcoin reaching an all-time high this year and currently trading at around $69,500.

While Tether hasn't officially revealed its Bitcoin addresses, The Block confirmed last year Tether's one Bitcoin address, and that address has been accumulating bitcoins every quarter since September 2022. With the latest Q1 purchase, Tether has now become the seventh-largest holder of bitcoin from its previous rank of 11 earlier this year.

When contacted, Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino confirmed to The Block that the company purchased additional bitcoins, saying that the purchase of 8,888 bitcoins occurred throughout the first quarter. "It was bought over the full quarter, then settled at the end," Ardoino said as the address shows one lot of purchase on March 31.

Tether's bitcoin holdings

Tether first disclosed its bitcoin holdings in May 2023 as part of its first-quarter attestation report for that year. At the time, the company said it would purchase bitcoins with up to 15% of its profits every quarter as it shifts its stablecoin reserves toward crypto and away from U.S. government debt.

Besides its direct investments in bitcoin, Tether is also active in the bitcoin mining and energy production space. The company recently also entered the AI space, saying it aims "to pioneer the development of open-source, multimodal AI models to set new industry standards, driving innovation and accessibility within AI technology."

Tether's primary business is running the USDT stablecoin, which helped it generate $5.4 billion worth of excess reserves as of Dec. 31, 2023, according to the firm's latest fourth-quarter attestation report published earlier this year. Tether remains the largest stablecoin issuer, with a total USDT supply standing at over 109 billion, according to The Block's Data Dashboard.