Cryptocurrency giant quietly hoards goods, CEO boldly claiming Tether will become one of the world's largest gold central banks.

Every week, more than a ton of gold is transported into the heavily guarded gold vault owned by the cryptocurrency giant Tether Holdings SA, which is currently known as the world's largest non-bank, non-governmental gold repository. In the past year, Tether has quietly become one of the largest participants in the global gold market - this is the epitome of the meeting of the worlds of cryptocurrency and gold, both of which do not trust government debt, a major reason for the surge in gold prices to historic highs. However, its internal operations, or gold strategy, are little known to the outside world. Last year, when two senior gold traders left the big banks in the gold business at HSBC, there was speculation within the industry about where they were heading; but few guessed that the answer was Tether. The company's CEO Paolo Ardoino compares its role in the gold market to that of a central bank: "Let's put it this way, we will soon be one of the largest central banks in the world."