Circle vs Tether

Circle4.7/5

VS

Tether4.0/5

Feature	CircleVisit	TetherVisit
Ratings
Our score	4.7/5	4.0/5
User rating	No reviews yet	No reviews yet
Reserves & transparency	5.0	4.5
Peg stability	4.5	4.0
Regulation	5.0	2.5
Liquidity & chains	5.0	5.0
Redemption	4.0	3.5
Specs
Tickers	USDC, EURC	USDT, EURT, XAUT
Pegged to	US dollar	US dollar
Backing	Cash & treasuries	Cash & treasuries
Yield-bearing	No	No
Regulated issuer	Yes	No
Licenses & charters	US BitLicense (NYDFS), US FinCEN MSB, France EMI (ACPR / MiCA), UK EMI (FCA), Singapore MPI (MAS), ADGM FSRA FSP, Bermuda Class F	Not disclosed
Supply / market cap	$72.9B as of October 2026	>$90 billion on Tron alone
Chains	Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche, Base, Stellar	Tron, Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche, Polygon, Celo, Near, Tezos, Algorand, EOS, Liquid Network, Omni
Reserve reports	Monthly reserve attestations by Deloitte & Touche, with daily CUSIP-level reporting of the Circle Reserve Fund via BlackRock.	Quarterly BDO Italia attestations and KPMG US financial audit
Redemption terms	1:1 par redemption with 0% fees via Circle Mint for verified institutional accounts; retail redemptions via secondary exchanges.	Not disclosed
Issuer can freeze tokens	Yes	Yes
Company
Founded	2013	2014
Headquarters	United States	El Salvador
Investors	Not disclosed	Cantor Fitzgerald
Strengths and weaknesses
Pros	Reserves backed 1:1 by cash and short-dated Treasuries with daily CUSIP reporting Monthly reserve attestations published by Deloitte & Touche Direct institutional minting and redemption at 1:1 with zero fees via Circle Mint Holds regulatory licenses in the US, EU, UK, and Singapore	Over $90 billion in liquidity on the Tron network alone Completed a full independent US GAAP financial statement audit by KPMG U.S Maintained a reserve surplus over liabilities of $6.814 billion at year-end 2025 Supported across virtually every major centralized exchange and trading pair
Cons	Circle has onchain blacklist capabilities to freeze tokens on public addresses Direct fiat redemption requires corporate KYB onboarding through Circle Mint Depegged to $0.87 during the March 2023 Silicon Valley Bank failure Reserves carry counterparty exposure to partner banks holding cash deposits	European spot trading pairs delisted under EU MiCA regulatory requirements Issuer retains smart contract authority to freeze token balances arbitrarily CFTC found reserves were fully backed on only 27.6% of days in 2016-2018 No direct yield paid to retail stablecoin token holders
Best for	Institutional cross-border payment settlement, DeFi liquidity providers and traders, European entities needing MiCA compliance	High-frequency crypto exchange traders, Cross-border transfer recipients outside the EU, Tron network settlement users

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