Coinbase Entices Users to Switch From USDT to USDC, Crypto Firm Says Recent Events ‘Put Some Stablecoins to the Test’

Coinbase, one of the largest cryptocurrency firms in the industry, has published a blog post that tells users to “switch to the trusted and reputable digital dollar,” referring to the stablecoin asset usd coin. The company’s blog post specifically mentions switching the stablecoin asset tether over to usd coin, and the firm is offering “zero fees” to swap these two tokens.

Coinbase Offers Users Zero Fees to Switch From Tether to Usd Coin, Crypto Community Questions Motive

On Thursday, Dec. 8, 2022, Coinbase shared a new blog post and tweeted the statement: “Switch to a trusted stablecoin: usd coin (USDC). Now convert tether (USDT) to USDC with zero fees.” The company’s blog post goes into more detail as it notes that customers can swap tether (USDT) for usd coin (USDC) “with zero fees.” The blog post notes that events that have taken place during the last few weeks have shaken the crypto industry’s trust.

“The events of the past few weeks have put some stablecoins to the test and we’ve seen a flight to safety,” Coinbase’s blog post explains. “We believe that [usd coin] (USDC) is a trusted and reputable stablecoin, so we’re making it more frictionless to switch: starting today we’re waiving fees for global retail customers to convert USDT to USDC.”

Coinbase’s statements gave crypto proponents the perception that the blog post was indirectly questioning Tether’s stablecoin, the current largest stablecoin asset by market cap today. “Shots fired. Bang bang,” the Twitter account known as Autism Capital replied to Coinbase’s tweet about the subject. A number of other crypto supporters disagreed with Coinbase’s statements. The strategy advisor at Vaneck, Gabor Gurbacs, opined that it was more likely people would choose USDT.

“Tether was the first stablecoin in the world and has been trusted by millions around the world since its inception,” Gurbacs said in a response to Coinbase’s tweet on Thursday. “In fact if you ask people outside a narrow group in the U.S. they’d pick tether over USDC,” Gurbacs added.

The Twitter account known as the Byzantine General wrote: “Not a good look. Also looks desperate. Makes me trust USDC a little less.” The operators of the decentralized finance (defi) platform Curve Finance found a humorous silver lining in the situation when the defi platform’s Twitter account tweeted:

Yes, let’s shift back and forth really often. Loving it.

The statements from Coinbase follow the recent auto-conversion from USDC to BUSD events at Binance and Wazirx. Furthermore, USDC’s market valuation has dropped a great deal during the past few months. USDC’s market cap tapped a high of more than 56 billion nominal U.S. dollars in June 2022.

Today, the USDC market cap is 23.57% lower at $42.80 billion. Tether’s market cap, however, has shrunk a great deal as well, sliding from a high of more than 83 billion nominal U.S. dollars to today’s $65.86 billion. Tether’s market cap hit the $83 billion high in April 2022 and now it’s 20.65% lower according to statistics recorded on Dec. 9, 2022.

What do you think about Coinbase’s recent statement regarding switching over from tether to usd coin? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.