Tether Co-Founder’s Startup Wants to Usher in ‘Stablecoin 2.0’

A new startup from one of the founders of Tether is reportedly taking a page from the traditional finance world.

STBL mimics traditional finance’s zero-coupon strip structures by turning digital assets into a dollar-pegged stablecoin and yield-bearing non-fungible token (NFT), CoinDesk reported Thursday (Sept. 18). The components can be held separately, letting investors keep the part that appeals to them and sell the rest to counterparties that hold different attitudes to risk.

“Our mission at STBL is to evolve stablecoins from corporate products into public infrastructure,” STBL co-founder Reeve Collins, who also helped found Tether, said in the report. “For the first time, minters, not issuers, retain the value of reserves. This is the defining shift of Stablecoin 2.0: money that is stable, compliant and built to serve the community.”

When a yield-bearing on-chain asset is deposited and locked into the STBL protocol, it splits into a stablecoin (USST) that can circulate and function as collateral or reserves in decentralized finance and a separate, yield-accruing NFT called YLD, according to the report.

“When a user who’s already whitelisted with a Franklin Templeton or BlackRock fund locks that asset into STBL, they receive an NFT that controls the vault,” STBL CEO and co-founder Avtar Sehra said, per the report. “You hold the NFT and accrue interest, while the stable asset can be used as collateral, as reserves, or to mint an ecosystem-specific stablecoin aligned with GENIUS Act requirements.”

In related news, Tether is planning to match the success it has seen with stablecoins in other countries by bringing a new token to the United States.

Bo Hines, strategic advisor for digital assets and U.S. at Tether, said the company wants to be “the largest player in the U.S. market.”

“We already are abroad, and we want to match that here,” Hines said, adding that two of the customers Tether hopes to serve in the U.S. are underbanked and underserved consumers and enterprise clients, including banks.

Meanwhile, Bryce Jurss of Nuvei described to PYMNTS this week a long-term vision for stablecoins in the B2B payments sector in which businesses end up with the tokens on their balance sheets, no matter how their customers pay.

“Ultimately, once it does trickle down to the consumer, they may have stablecoins, they might not even know they’re using stablecoins,” Jurss said. “And you’re getting all these faster payments happening on the back end.”