Average profit of $90 million per person, the world's largest private buyer of gold

Author: Lin Wanwan, Dongcha Beating

A private company has become the world’s largest holder of gold outside of central banks.

Paolo Ardoino has been very busy lately. He spends 1 billion USD every month, buys 1 to 2 tons of gold weekly, and says “it won’t stop in the coming months.”

Paolo is not a central bank governor of any country; he is the CEO of the world’s largest stablecoin company, Tether.

USDT issued by Tether is the largest stablecoin globally, with a circulation of about 187 billion USD. The business model is extremely simple: give it 1 USD, and it gives you 1 USDT token. You trade with the token, and it uses the USD to buy government bonds to earn interest.

In 2024, net profit exceeds 13 billion USD. This team of about 150 people has an average profit of approximately 86 million USD per person. Based on the first three quarters of 2025, with net profits already surpassing 10 billion USD, the full-year forecast is 15 billion USD, surpassing Goldman Sachs. This year, Tether may achieve an average profit of 100 million USD per person.

But this company, which relies on USD, has been doing one non-core activity in recent years: aggressively hoarding gold.

Tether has accumulated about 140 tons of gold, worth approximately 24 billion USD. This figure exceeds the reserves of countries like South Korea, Hungary, Greece, Qatar, and Australia.

Tether has become the largest gold holder outside of central banks worldwide.

At this pace, Tether purchases over 1 billion USD worth of gold each month. The gold price has risen from about 2,650 USD at the end of September 2024 to over 5,100 USD now, and Tether’s unrealized gains on paper have far exceeded 5 billion USD.

Ardoino once said, “Gold is logically safer than any national currency.”

Many of Tether’s users come from countries like Turkey, Argentina, and Nigeria, where long-term currency devaluation is common. They use USDT, essentially escaping their own central banks. Ardoino pushes this logic further: what if someday the USD also fails?

Sell USD with one hand, hoard gold with the other. He knows better than anyone where the risks lie.

Gold Vaults in Nuclear Bunkers and Traders Dug from HSBC

The gold purchased by Tether is stored in a former nuclear bunker in Switzerland.

During the Cold War, Switzerland built about 370,000 nuclear bunkers to defend against atomic bombs, most of which are now abandoned. Tether converted one of these into a gold vault. Ardoino describes the place as “guarded by multiple thick steel doors, with over 1 ton of gold transported in weekly,” a “James Bond-style location.”

Physical gold is not a liability of anyone, does not depend on any government credit, and cannot be frozen, sanctioned, or printed out of thin air. It is one of the oldest sources of security.

But Ardoino’s ambitions go beyond hoarding; he also wants to do trading.

The global gold trading market is monopolized by large banks like JPMorgan, HSBC, and Citibank, controlling pricing and liquidity.

In November 2025, HSBC’s Global Metals Trading Head Vincent Domien and European, Middle East, and Africa Precious Metals Head Mathew O’Neill both resigned. Both are top industry figures: Domien has been HSBC’s global metals trading head since 2022 and is a board member of the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA); O’Neill has worked at HSBC since 2008.

Their new employer is Tether.

A crypto company has poached some of the top traditional gold traders, causing a stir in London’s financial district.

Ardoino says he needs “the world’s best gold trading platform” to buy gold long-term and “capitalize on potential market inefficiencies.”

Buying about 1 billion USD worth of physical gold each month is actually quite troublesome, as it involves solving a series of logistical challenges.

Currently, Tether “sources directly from Swiss refineries and large financial institutions; a large order can take months to arrive.” They have no bargaining power in the supply chain; how much to buy and when to receive depends on others’ willingness.

Building their own trading capability is to break free from this passivity. Saving 0.5% in trading costs could amount to 60 million USD annually. More importantly, it gives them control.

From Central Banks to Gold Conglomerates

Tether’s attitude toward gold is increasingly resembling that of a central bank.

There are two reasons why central banks like gold: it has good liquidity recognized worldwide, and it is not a liability dependent on any country’s credit.

After Trump took office, tariffs threatened constantly, and the USD fell to its lowest in three years. Meanwhile, global central banks increased their gold holdings. The National Bank of Poland was the largest buyer among central banks in 2024 and 2025, adding about 90 tons in 2024 and continuing to lead in 2025. China, Russia, Turkey, India, and Brazil are also steadily increasing their holdings.

Tether has taken this trend to the extreme. It is doing the same as central banks in a private way. Jefferies analysts pointed out that Tether, as “an important new buyer, may drive continued growth in gold demand,” accounting for about 2% of global gold demand in Q3 2025. A stablecoin company has become one of the drivers of rising gold prices.

But their layout goes beyond that. Tether is also quietly acquiring shares in gold royalty companies.

Royalty companies purchase income streams from miners. Miners dig gold, and royalty companies take a portion of the revenue, similar to rent collection. The benefit is not having to mine yourself or bear extraction risks—just sit back and collect dividends.

According to Bloomberg, Tether has invested over 200 million USD to acquire about 37.8% of Elemental Altus Royalties, and has added another 100 million USD to support its merger with EMX. It also holds shares in several mid-sized Canadian-listed royalty companies like Metalla Royalty, Versamet Royalties, and Gold Royalty.

The person behind this is Juan Sartori, Tether’s Vice President of Strategic Projects.

He was a senator in Uruguay, co-owner of the Premier League team Sunderland, vice chairman of AS Monaco football club, and founder of Union Group. Politician, businessman, football boss, and crypto executive—an international mix of identities.

From downstream stablecoins, to midstream physical gold and trading capabilities, to upstream mining rights, Tether is building a complete gold industry chain, increasingly resembling a gold conglomerate.

Besides physical gold, Tether also has a gold token called XAUT. Buying 1 XAUT corresponds to physical gold stored in a Swiss vault, and if you want to redeem, they can ship you gold bars. Currently, XAUT accounts for about 60% of the global gold token market, with a circulating market cap of approximately 2.7 billion USD. By the end of 2025, XAUT is backed by about 16.2 tons of physical gold.

Ardoino predicts it could reach a circulation of 5 to 10 billion USD by the end of 2026. If it hits 10 billion, that would require increasing gold reserves by about 60 tons. Just to support XAUT, they need to buy over 1 ton of gold weekly.

He also issued a prophecy: “Some countries are buying large amounts of gold, and we believe they will soon launch tokenized versions of gold as a competitor to the USD.”

He didn’t specify which countries. But everyone knows who has been buying gold crazily in recent years.

Someone is always ready with their vault

James Rickards, former Pentagon financial warfare advisor, wrote in “Currency Wars”: the underlying of currency competition is reserve competition.

In the 1960s, French Finance Minister Valéry Giscard d’Estaing complained that the US enjoyed “arrogant privileges,” printing paper money, while the rest of the world had to exchange it for real gold and silver.

This game has been played for sixty years, relying on the trust in the US dollar.

Trust, once broken, can collapse quickly. This is also the core logic of reserve wars.

Superficially, trade wars, tariff wars, and exchange rate wars are just external manifestations of currency credit competition. The foundation of currency credit lies in the quality of reserves.

When the USD is repeatedly weaponized—freezing foreign exchange reserves, cutting off SWIFT channels, imposing financial sanctions—the world has to rethink: what kind of reserves are truly safe?

Central banks understand this, so they are quietly increasing their holdings. Tether also understands this, which is why it is hoarding crazily.

The World Gold Council’s chief strategist John Reade said that Tether’s purchases influence gold prices but are only a small part of the reason for the rise. He added, “What’s really interesting is that one of the main participants in the crypto space views gold as a primitive USD devaluation trade.”

In August 2025, Tether hired Bo Hines, former executive director of the White House Cryptocurrency Committee under the Trump administration, as a U.S. strategic advisor. During his tenure, he helped push through the US’s first stablecoin regulation law, the Genius Act. In January 2026, Tether launched a U.S.-compliant token called USAT.

While hoarding gold in Swiss bunkers, they are lobbying in Washington—both hands are very strong.

Gold continues to hit new highs, and the USD has fallen to a three-year low. In a nondescript cave at the foot of the Swiss Alps, another ton of gold has been transported in, and the heavy steel door is slowly closing.

This world is indeed becoming more turbulent, but some people have already built their vaults in advance.

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