[rich_sasha]

The report is still quite light on details. They list "commercial paper" under cash and equivalent... Which could mean they lend money to apple short term and get 0.5% interest, or it could be highly speculative lending to Colombian agricultural companies.

Either way, what Tether does is essentially banking ("give us money, we'll hold it and, pinky promise, if you want it back, you'll get it no problem"). The bar for bank transparency and regulation is far, far higher than what Tether presents.

[ufo]

Another crucial detail is that these attestations are not an audit of assets vs liabilities. In the past, Tether has been caught borrowing money in the day of the attestation to give the impression that there's more in their bank account than there really is.