Attendees clapped and cheered when Paolo Ardoino, the public face of perhaps most influential company in crypto, entered the stage at the Cantor Fitzgerald Global Technology Conference in New York on Wednesday. Ardoino stood out from the crowd, not for his wealth but for his choice of attire. While others dressed to impress, he opted for a laid-back look — a light blue Ralph Lauren polo and gray khakis — despite likely having the deepest pockets in the room. “This is my first trip to America,” he started off saying. “It’s beautiful. I feel very welcomed.” Ardoino indeed avoided the country for a long time. The Italy-born computer scientist until recently mainly focused Tether’s operations on developing regions, with financial freedom as the stated goal. Another reason could be that Tether has been under scrutiny from industry leaders as well as U.S. authorities for some time, including the Department of Justice (DOJ), the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYFSD). That's changed. Ardoino has been on a tour of the U.S. over the past week, posting photos of himself on the U.S. Capitol Building steps in Washington D.C. on Thursday and participating in a fireside chat with Strike CEO Jack Mallers at a Tuesday event organized by the Bitcoin Policy Institute. The company, which according to Ardoino is run by only 150 employees across 50 countries, settled charges with the CFTC and an NYDFS inquiry in 2021. There have been numerous reports of an ongoing Department of Justice investigation into the stablecoin issuer as well over the past few years. “We’ve been through hell,” Ardoino told attendees at the conference. “People were saying that if I came to the U.S. I’d be arrested ... They will try to scare you off." "We’re still here, right?” After a rundown of Tether’s previous success in the stablecoin business — the company reportedly made a $13 billion profit in 2024 and its stablecoin, USDT, holds over 60% of market share among stablecoins — Ardoino went on to present current projects that the company is working on, including its efforts in education, AI and real-world asset (RWA) tokenization. “The outlook for this year is wonderful as well,” Ardoino said. Ardoino's U.S. journey came at a time when the U.S. legislature is moving forward to regulate the $200 billion and rapidly growing stablecoin market. Tether is dominating the asset class with its $143 billion USDT cryptocurrency, followed by U.S.-based competitor Circle with its $58 billion USDC token. While Tether is an offshore company — it recently announced its intention to establish its headquarters in El Salvador — and has yet to show interest in formally entering the U.S. crypto market, its ties to the U.S. are multifaceted. The firm is one of the biggest buyers of U.S. debt, holding nearly $100 billion worth of U.S. Treasuries and government-backed securities as a reserve asset for its USDT token. If it were a country, it would be among the top 20 U.S. debt holders . Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said during a White House digital asset summit on Friday that stablecoins are key to preserving the U.S. dollar as the dominant reserve currency in the world, a line of argument that Ardoino touted multiple occasions before. The company also gained a powerful ally in the Trump administration in Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, former CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, the Wall Street investment firm that manages Tether's U.S. Treasury holdings. The Wall Street Journal reported that Cantor is also invested in Tether's holding company, while Lutnick said during his confirmation hearing that Cantor holds Tether convertible bonds but has no equity stake. Ardoino, in an interview with CoinDesk last year, said that the firm also onboarded U.S. agencies such as the FBI and Secret Service to its platform in an effort to combat illicit activities. On the investment front, Tether became a major shareholder with a $775 million investment in U.S.-listed video sharing platform Rumble, popular among U.S. conservative and right-wing users. With Tether's backing, Rumble CEO Chris Pavloski laid out plans to introduce a crypto wallet and support payments with USDT, BTC and Tether's gold-backed token XAUT. Pavloski repeatedly called Ardoino while he was on stage Wednesday.
