A new fiat-pegged stablecoin called GBPT was launched this Wednesday by Tether, the company behind the largest stablecoin by market capitalization. Aside from GBPT, Tether offers four other fiat-currency pegged tokens on the market: USDT for U.S. dollars, EURT for Euros, CNHT for Chinese Yuans, and MXNT for Mexican Pesos.
As a stable digital asset, GBPT is pegged 1:1 to the British Pound Sterling. According to the Tether announcement, GBPT will be developed by the same developers as tether USDT and operate under tether.to. GBPT will make British Pounds available on the blockchain and make asset transfers faster and cheaper.
Currently, USDT has a market cap of $68 billion and just recently launched on the Polygon network.
In the past 24 hours, USDT has been trading around $40.9 billion globally, while the entire crypto ecosystem has traded $76.5 billion yesterday.
Among the 13,471 crypto assets with a market cap exceeding $956 billion, USDT is the third-largest with a market cap of 7.035%.
Tether’s GBPT announcement followed Circle’s recent euro coin launch (EUROC). Circle’s EUROC is the second fiat-pegged stablecoin they have released, whereas Tether has released several different kinds over the years.
“We believe that the United Kingdom is the next frontier for blockchain innovation and the wider implementation of cryptocurrency for financial markets. We hope to help lead this innovation by providing cryptocurrency users worldwide with access to a GBP-denominated stablecoin issued by the largest stablecoin issuer,”
said Paolo Ardoino, CTO of Tether.
“Tether is ready and willing to work with UK regulators to make this goal a reality and looks forward to the continued adoption of Tether stablecoins,”
said Ardoino.
In launching GBPT, Tether continues to pioneer stablecoin technology and bring the world’s largest and most liquid stablecoins to global markets. In addition to strengthening the British Pound Sterling’s dominance worldwide, GBPT also provides an opportunity for USDT and EURT to trade in FX. It will also serve as an entry point into the decentralized finance ecosystem.