Tether's USDT, the world's largest stablecoin with a market cap of nearly $190 billion, is returning to the Bitcoin network. The issuance will be handled by the Utexo project, which received a commercial license to use the USDT trademark.
What is happening
According to CoinDesk, USDT began life on Bitcoin in 2014, on the Omni protocol. Ethereum and later Tron became its main venues, and the first blockchain was left aside. Utexo now plans to start issuing USDT on Bitcoin in the coming weeks.
The project was founded in 2025 and raised $7.5 million in funding this year. Co-founder Viktor Ihnatiuk told CoinDesk that the license lets the token reach exchanges, wallets and payment providers.
"Tether has always been a Bitcoin company. Bitcoin for them is a stability haven, along with gold."
- Viktor Ihnatiuk, co-founder of Utexo, from a CoinDesk interview, September 2026
How it will work technically
Utexo uses the RGB protocol. Unlike Ethereum and Tron, where balances are recorded in a public ledger, transfer data stays off the main blockchain. The counterparties check it between themselves (this is called client-side validation), and Bitcoin is used only for cryptographic proof of ownership.
Ownership is tied to UTXOs, the leftover unspent outputs of Bitcoin transactions. As a result, a USDT transfer on Bitcoin is more private than the same transfer on ERC-20 or TRC-20.
Instead, Utexo will keep a blacklist of UTXOs linked to sanctions or illicit activity and pass it to exchanges and other providers. A flagged UTXO becomes unredeemable: it cannot be sent to a bridge or minting tool, or withdrawn to Ethereum or Tron.
What it is for
Utexo names three main use cases. The first is private USDT transfers. The second is direct swaps of native BTC for USDT without routing through an exchange. The third is lending, where a borrower posts real Bitcoin as collateral instead of a wrapped token such as WBTC.
The project will provide infrastructure through APIs, SDKs and a cloud service. Exchanges, wallet providers and payment companies will be able to offer USDT on Bitcoin without building it themselves.
The next step Utexo named is Lightning, the layer-2 network for faster and cheaper Bitcoin payments. There, USDT may become a token for paying fees. USDC, the second-largest stablecoin, plays a similar role on Arc, Circle's new blockchain.
Tether's position and the market
Ihnatiuk clarified that he does not speak for Tether. In his personal view, Bitcoin is a priority for the company, and Utexo's job is to make USDT as accessible on Bitcoin as it is everywhere else.
Tether itself, according to Bitcoin Treasuries data from mid-August, holds about 100,000 BTC, worth $8.4 billion. The company buys bitcoin regularly, and Utexo presents that commitment as part of a broader strategy.
For Ukrainian users, a reminder: today USDT is most often exchanged on the Tron and Ethereum networks. The new Bitcoin version has not gone on sale yet, so it is too early to talk about support in exchangers.
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