The unnamed “Big Four” firm that Tether selected to audit its $185 billion USDT-pegged stablecoin is KPMG, the Financial Times reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.
Tether has also hired PwC to prepare its internal systems ahead of the audit, marking the most concrete step yet toward full financial scrutiny for the world’s largest stablecoin issuer. CoinDesk has contacted Tether for comment on the matter.
CoinDesk reported earlier this week that Tether had said it had entered into a formal engagement with a Big Four auditor, but the stablecoin issuer did not identify the company. Chief Financial Officer Simon McWilliams said at the time that Tether was “already operating to the Big Four audit standard” and that “the audit will be performed.”
All of this comes as the El Salvador-based company prepares for an expansion in the United States and a potential fundraising round. The Financial Times previously reported that Tether was facing doubts from investors in its efforts to raise between $15 billion and $20 billion for a $500 billion valuation, with concerns focused on pricing and regulatory risk.
The audit push comes at a crucial time. USDT, with approximately $185 billion in circulation, serves as a reserve currency for crypto markets and a major buyer of US Treasury bills, linking digital assets to traditional financial systems at scale.
A full audit of the financial statements would go far beyond the monthly certifications currently published by BDO Italia and would require a detailed review of assets, liabilities, internal controls and reporting systems.
That level of disclosure has long been a sticking point for critics, as Tether has faced persistent questions about its reserves since its launch in 2014 and has historically fought against transparency.
In 2021, CoinDesk filed a FOIL request with the New York Attorney General’s office seeking documents regarding the composition of USDT reserves. Tether fought the release in court and lost twice.
The documents, received after a two-year legal battle in 2023, revealed that Tether held the vast majority of its $40.6 billion in reserves at Bahamas-based Deltec Bank as of March 2021, with heavy exposure to commercial paper issued by Chinese and international banks, including the Agricultural Bank of China, Hong Kong Bank of China and ICBC.
Tether’s move towards greater transparency aligns with a changing regulatory context in the United States as cryptocurrencies as a whole become a mainstream asset class used by Wall Street.
The GENIUS Act, enacted last July, established the first federal framework for stablecoins in the US, under which Tether has already launched a dollar-pegged token, USAT.
