Tether vs. USD Coin on-chain data reveals two very different stablecoins
USD Coin (USDC), a stablecoin issued by the U.S.-based Circle Financials Ltd, is taking the lead over its top rival, Tether (USDT), when it comes to institutional adoption, according to on-chain data.
The market capitalization of USDC tokens in circulation comes to be around $44 billion versus USDT's $65.42 billion. However, USDC's daily transfer value on the Ethereum blockchain has been consistently higher than USDT throughout 2022, data from Glassnode shows.
For instance, as of Nov. 22, the USDC daily transfer was around $14 billion compared to USDT's $5 billion.
In other words, USDC users engage in relatively higher capital transfers compared to USDT users, suggesting that USDC is increasingly the stablecoin of choice among high net-worth entities including institutional whales, hedge funds, family offices, crypto exchanges, etc.
Related: 82% of Tether reserves held in ‘extremely liquid’ assets, according to attestation
Furthermore, USDC leads USDT in terms of its supply weight across smart contracts as of Nov. 22. Notably, the former made up 33.75% of the total stablecoin supply locked across staking pools. In comparison, USDT's supply is around 12.50%.
But the higher daily transaction count versus USDC suggests that Tether is more likely used for retail trading and transfers such as remittances.
On the other hand, USDC appears like a top stablecoin choice for tech-savvy institutional traders that lock their funds in staking contracts to earn yield.
This is further reflected in USDC's lower daily active addresses count of 40,245 versus USDT's 73,000, as recorded on Nov. 21.
Additionally, crypto trading platforms implementing so-called "proof-of-reserves" after the FTX collapse appear to hold more Tether over the USD Coin,
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