You Won’t Believe How Europe’s Banks Are Flirting With Disaster, Says Tether Boss

by

What to know:

  • Paolo Ardoino, sovereign ruler—I mean, CEO—of Tether, predicts a veritable “bankocalypse” is brewing in Europe. The culprits: risky lending, clumsy crypto regulation, and apparently, a governmental fondness for playing with matches near piles of hay.
  • The EU, displaying the strategic wisdom of asking a goose for investment advice, requires stablecoin companies to store a king’s ransom in uninsured bank deposits. Even the local baker’s boy would spot the flaw here—except, perhaps, for the bankers themselves. 🤦‍♂️
  • Ardoino couldn’t resist comparing this to the celebrated fall of Silicon Valley Bank, as if to say: “Behold! We have seen this circus before!” 🎪

Ah, picture the scene—a dimly-lit banker’s office in Brussels. Shadows flit across the walls. Ardoino, furrowed brow, points dramatically at a pile of paperwork, surrounded by startled officials and trembling ledger-keepers. With unrestrained glee, he decries: “The future of Europe’s finance wobbles like Aunt Ursula after three glasses of kvass!”

Our hero—if we can call any CEO a hero—spoke to the podcasting minstrels of “Less Noise More Signal,” breaking the news that Tether, and other stablecoin nobles, must keep up to 60% of reserves in small banks, which boast about as much protection as a sugar cube in a rainstorm.

“How much insurance? Why, a mere 100,000 euros!” Ardoino scoffs, twirling his mustache, or so one assumes. “If you’re holding a billion euros, that cover is akin to spitting on a bonfire and expecting steam, not more flames.” 🔥

But wait, there’s more tragicomic arithmetic. Banks, being what they are, take most of these deposits, pass them around to home-buyers, bakers, and ambitious start-uppers, until scarcely a thimbleful is left. Six billion in deposits? “We’ll lend five point four,” says an invisible banker, whistling as he hands your money to a man who sells pigeons.

Tether CEO @paoloardoino to @pahueg: “Many” European banks will “blow up” in the “next few years.”

— Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) May 1, 2025

Now, with just a 20% run—no stampedes necessary—banks could be left chasing ghosts instead of euros. “If the bank falls, the stablecoin falls, and then Europe dusts its hands, exclaiming, ‘Aha! The coins are to blame!’” Ardoino narrates, as if auditioning for a state play about tragic calamities.

And just when you thought the tale was merely about banking sorceries, in struts regulation—meant to help, as useless as a fur hat in July. Stablecoin ventures find the grand banks (UBS and such) have bolted the doors, so they court the town’s humble bankers, who, history suggests, may have studied risk management in the same academy where the village fool learned juggling.

Of course, while these continental hijinks continue, Tether’s off investing in the New World and even eyeing up stakes in Latin American agro-kingdoms. Was it P.T. Barnum or Nikolai Gogol who said, “There’s a showman born every minute”? In Europe today—even the bankers have started clowning. 🤹‍♂️

Read More

2025-05-03 19:21