Terra may own $3.6 billion in UST and USDT

Terra Labs may own $3.6 billion in Tether (USDT) and Terra USD (UST) used for price manipulation on exchanges and in DeFi or for money laundering. Authorities are verifying the news with exchanges. 

Terra and the alleged $3.6 billion in USDT and UST funds

According to reports by CoinDesk Korea, it appears that Terra Labs may own a fund of nearly $3.6 billion in Tether (USDT) and Terra USD (UST), used for price manipulation on exchanges and in DeFi or money laundering. 

JUST IN: According to CoinDesk Korea, Do Kwon’s Terraform Labs has $3.6 billion in $UST and $USDT that might have been used for price manipulation and money laundering.

— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) June 28, 2022

“JUST IN: According to CoinDesk Korea, Do Kwon’s Terraform Labs has $3.6 billion in $UST and $USDT that might have been used for price manipulation and money laundering”.

Authorities are verifying the report with the exchanges of Binance, Coinbase, Huobi and Kucoin for confirmation. 

Specifically, the report found that money was used to manipulate markets and launder money for the current LUNC (the former LUNA) on DeFi and controlled exchanges.

Terra Labs and analysis from blockchain security companies after the collapse

Following the collapse of the Terra project, blockchain security companies Uppsala Security and CoinDesk Korea stepped in to investigate, directly examining data on the chain. 

Apparently, the source wallet for the Terra crash is this address: 

0x8d47f08ebc5554504742f547eb721a43d4947d0a.

As it turned out, Terraform Labs and Luna Foundation Guard (LFG) had transferred USDT, USDC and UST worth $7.4 billion into two Binance portfolios. Chain data was used to show that this was a wallet owned or controlled by LFG. From here, an additional unidentified cash flow worth about $3.6 billion also emerged.

The attacks on the stablecoins of Tether and Tron

Terra’s collapse also strongly affected other stablecoins like that of Tether (USDT) and Tron (USDD). 

Recently, in fact, USDD had lost its peg to the dollar, slipping to $0.91 and fueling speculation that it would go the same way as Terra. 

Justin Sun, founder and CEO of Tron, the blockchain on which USDD’s algorithmic stablecoin runs, reportedly tweeted that the funding rate on Binance’s exchange for betting against (or “shorting”) TRX was negative 500%. Precisely to counter this speculation against Tron, Sun also reported that TronDAO would deploy $2 billion to counter it. 

As for Tether (USDT), its CTO Paolo Ardoino reportedly confirmed that the USDT/USD perpetual futures exchange pair had been targeted. 

Apparently, the implosion of USDT by trolls reportedly began in early May, similar to UST and Luna, but was completely resolved within 2 days. 

Ardoino had stated that the hedge funds that attacked USDT believed and supported all the FUD spread about Tether in recent years, such as the assumption that it was not 100% hedged or that it had issued tokens out of thin air.