Tether's USAT stablecoin launches on Celo with native mint, burn, and gas fee support
USAT, the US-regulated dollar stablecoin backed by Tether and issued by Anchorage Digital Bank, went live on the Celo blockchain on March 31. It’s the token’s first deployment outside of Ethereum, and it. . .
USAT, the US-regulated dollar stablecoin backed by Tether and issued by Anchorage Digital Bank, went live on the Celo blockchain on March 31. It’s the token’s first deployment outside of Ethereum, and it arrives with native minting, burning, and planned gas fee payment capabilities baked in. What USAT brings to CeloThe Celo deployment includes core infrastructure that makes USAT functional from day one. Users can mint and burn tokens natively, which means creating and redeeming USAT directly on the Celo network rather than bridging from Ethereum. Gas fee support, the ability to pay transaction costs in USAT itself rather than needing the chain’s native token, is also on the table. That feature is pending Celo governance approval, but if passed, it removes a meaningful friction point for new users who don’t already hold CELO tokens. Distribution will be handled through a Self proof-of-humanity faucet, supported by Google Cloud’s infrastructure. AdvertisementUSAT is backed 1:1 by US dollars with transparent reserves and regular attestations. Anchorage Digital Bank, N. A. handles all issuance and compliance, which draws a clear line between USAT and Tether’s flagship product, USDT. Why Celo, and why nowCelo already hosts over 4. 2 million weekly active users of USDT. The network has carved out a niche in mobile payments, particularly across Africa and Latin America, through integrations like Opera MiniPay, which counts over 14 million users. Rene Reinsberg, co-founder of Celo, framed the launch as validation for combining regulated stablecoins with identity infrastructure. Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino and Tether USA CEO Bo Hines both highlighted the accessibility angle, positioning the expansion as a way to bring regulated digital dollars to more users. The Anchorage Digital connectionTether invested $100 million in Anchorage Digital in February 2026, pushing the firm’s valuation to approximately $4. 2 billion. Anchorage is the only federally chartered crypto bank in the US, which gives USAT a regulatory pedigree that USDT simply doesn’t have. USAT launched earlier in 2026 on Ethereum before this Celo expansion. The token was purpose-built to be the kind of stablecoin that traditional financial institutions could actually touch without their compliance departments having a collective meltdown. What this means for investorsThe gas fee payment feature, assuming governance approves it, could be a quiet game-changer for onboarding. One of the biggest UX problems in crypto is telling a new user they need to buy some random token just to move the dollars they already have. Paying gas in USAT eliminates that step entirely. Circle has been aggressively expanding USDC across multiple chains, and PayPal’s PYUSD is making its own multi-chain moves. Tether launching a separate regulated product rather than trying to retrofit USDT’s compliance profile suggests the company believes the market needs both: an offshore trading stablecoin and a regulated payments stablecoin. Disclosure:This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see ourEditorial Policy.