[SilasX]

Eh, that just comes down to the arbitrary definition of how much of a discount you consider "losing the peg".

Sidestepping the definitional issue, I certainly worry when a pegged asset trades at a persistent discount, even a small one, when it didn't before. A stablecoin should generally trade at a premium just as often as it trades at a discount. When one goes long periods without ever being above, that is a strong signal. And when everyone panics, that's exactly when it's too late to get out. You have to beat the rush.

Remember, even up until the morning of May 9th, the day of the real TerraUSD depeg, people made that exact objection. "Oh come, on being 0.1% off is normal for stablecoin." Indeed it is -- but not in a persistent fashion!

Disclaimer: I closed out my Tether longs last week.

[shuckles]

Before you thought Tether was unable to hold a peg why would you be long Tether? Isn’t it better to just be long the USD?

[SilasX]

I had invested in liquidity pools (which collect fees for you for facilitating trades between tokens that you contribute), and some such pools had Tether. One downside of such pools is that, if any one of the assets in it goes to zero, all your invested capital goes to zero (though you keep the fees). It was therefore a Tether long.

I had also held a small amount for online purchases.

More generally, the reason to hold a stablecoin rather than a "real" dollar is because you need the former in order to interface with smartcontracts on blockchains. Also, to buy from merchants who sell goods for stablecoins because they're in a grey market that banks don't want to touch.

Side note: I don't know why people keep asking that question -- it gets asked and answered each time this topic comes up e.g.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31352262

[rglullis]

USDC has the exact same properties as USDT, but has no legal issue and is backed by an entity that is a infinitely more trustworthy.

There is Gemini USD - similar story.

There is DAI if you are long on ETH/BTC and still want/need liquidity.

Curve has a pool without USDT (cDAI/cUSDC).

Uniswap lets you make any type of pair. On its heyday (before v3), I was providing to DAI/USDC and I was getting 2% returns per month.

So my question is: why USDT, when there is a handful of better stabletokens that can be used for the exact same purpose? If it is common knowledge that Tether is not to be trusted, why would any honest person still use it?

[SilasX]

I’m familiar with the others and use them as well.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31422545

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31417134

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31412835

My comment was answering a question about “why stablecoins at all”.

To answer your question, because some uniswap v3 pools with USDT offered competitive returns, like the 0.05% WETH/USDT one. That was one of many I used, which included those that paired DAI or USDC with ETH.

I considered the concerns overblown at the time and so was okay with making some the USDT pools a part of my LP portfolio.

I’m honest.

[rglullis]

It's not about the "concerns" that we should be worried about. We should also be worried about not perpetuating a gigantic scam.

Honesty is not just about "I wasn't the one profiting from the bad thing". It's also "I'm willing to call evil/immoral for what it is".

[SilasX]

I don’t consider being slightly undercollateralized a “gigantic evil scam” and the rhetoric around Tether is still definitely overblown, and if that were your primary concern (or am I not supposed to say that anymore?), you should have led with it rather than comparing it to similar defi returns.