Without admitting or denying the allegations of the CFTC, Tether offered to settle to prevent an administrative proceeding against it.
In addition to the monetary penalty, the Commission ordered the company to stop violating Section 6(c)(1)(A) of the CE) and CFTC Regulation 180.1(a)(2).
In a statement, CFTC Acting Chairman Rostin Benham said, “This case highlights the expectation of honesty and transparency in the rapidly growing and developing digital assets marketplace. The CFTC will continue to take decisive action to bring to light untrue or misleading statements that impact CFTC jurisdictional markets.”
In a concurring statement, Commissioner Dawn Stump said, “The settlement with the Tether respondents finds that there were misrepresentations regarding the assets backing tether, specifically that the USDt tokens were backed 1-to-1 by US dollars. The evidence establishes that this assurance provided to tether customers was not 100% true, 100% of the time. When reviewing this record, it is clear to me that wrongdoing occurred, and that someone should be held accountable.”
