Tether said on August 13, 2026 that KPMG US completed the company’s first full annual financial audit, issuing an unqualified opinion on its 2025 statements and confirming that reserves exceeded liabilities by $6.814 billion as of December 31, 2025, according to Crypto Briefing and Tether’s own announcement. It is the first full-year audit in the USDT issuer’s history.
What happened?
Crypto Briefing reported that KPMG US delivered an unqualified opinion, the strongest verdict an external auditor can give, on Tether International’s 2025 financial statements. The audit went well beyond Tether’s long-running quarterly reserve attestations, examining the balance sheet, income statement, changes in equity and cash flows, along with supporting transactions, systems, ownership records, valuations and counterparties. KPMG also physically inspected and counted Tether’s gold bars as part of the verification, the outlet said.
Per Crypto Briefing, Tether CFO Simon McWilliams stated that the audited figures showed reserves exceeding liabilities by $6.814 billion at year-end 2025. CEO Paolo Ardoino described the completion as “a major milestone for Tether after years of scrutiny over the transparency and composition of reserves backing USDT.” Tether framed the exercise, in its own release, as the largest inaugural financial audit in its history, one prepared under US accounting standards and covering the balance sheet, income statement, changes in equity and cash flows. CCN reported the same headline surplus figure, roughly $6.8 billion, while noting caveats around the scope and timing. An unqualified, or “clean,” opinion is the profession’s strongest verdict, signaling that the auditor found no material matters requiring qualification.
Why does it matter?
Tether’s USDT is the largest stablecoin in circulation, and for years its critics have pressed on a single question: are the reserves really there? Quarterly attestations, which are narrower than a full audit, never fully settled that debate. An attestation confirms figures at a single point in time under agreed-upon procedures; a full financial-statement audit is a far broader examination of a company’s accounts, controls and counterparties. Moving from the former to the latter, and securing an unqualified opinion from a Big Four firm, is a materially higher bar and directly targets the transparency complaint that has followed the company. The hands-on gold-bar count, highlighted by Crypto Briefing, underscores that the review covered assets beyond cash and Treasuries.
The development also lands against a shifting regulatory backdrop. Under the US GENIUS Act, stablecoin issuers face rising expectations on reserve quality and disclosure to keep access to American markets, and coverage of the law has pointed to a compliance runway extending toward 2028 for issuers seeking to remain available on US exchanges. Tether has historically served a heavily international user base, but a clean annual audit strengthens its hand as institutions and regulators weigh which dollar tokens meet emerging standards. For readers following that theme, our stablecoin news hub tracks issuer disclosures across the market.
That said, an audit is a point-in-time verdict on 2025 accounts, not a live guarantee of the composition of reserves today. It confirms what the statements showed as of December 31, 2025, and the strength of the opinion, rather than making a claim about any current market price of USDT, which is designed to hold a $1 peg. USDT is used widely for trading, remittances and dollar access in markets with limited banking, which is part of why the composition and verifiability of its backing has drawn such sustained attention from regulators, exchanges and researchers over the years.
What to watch next?
The key questions now are cadence and consistency. A first full audit is significant, but repeatability, whether KPMG or another Big Four firm continues to audit Tether annually, is what would turn a milestone into a standard. Watch for how the completed audit is treated by exchanges and regulators assessing GENIUS Act compliance, and whether Circle and other issuers respond with comparable full-scope audits rather than attestations. The figures and quotes here are drawn from Crypto Briefing, Tether’s release and CCN; where CCN flagged caveats, that has been noted.
Sources: Crypto Briefing — Tether completes first full financial audit by Big Four firm KPMG; Tether — Tether Completes the Largest Inaugural Financial Audit in History; CCN — Tether’s First Full KPMG Audit With $6.8B Reserve Cushion
This is news reporting, not investment advice.
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Elena Petrova is a regulatory correspondent specializing in crypto law and policy with over 10 years of financial journalism experience. Formerly a finance reporter at Reuters, Elena covers SEC enforcement, MiCA implementation, and global stablecoin regulations. She holds a J.D. from Georgetown Law and is a member of the New York State Bar. Her regulatory analysis is frequently referenced by compliance officers and legal teams at major exchanges.
Conflicts of interest
I have no current legal practice or retainer relationships with any cryptocurrency company. Past employment relationships are listed publicly.
