The UK Treasury has declared this year that Britain is going to become the biggest crypto hub in the world located next to the EU. While regulators and lawmakers are constantly working on a framework that is providing the needed security for both consumers as well as for businesses, Tether, the world’s largest issuer of stablecoins announced the release of another product.

What is GBPT, why is it important and why is Tether releasing more new stablecoins all of a sudden?

Tether is busy releasing new products

Indeed, Tether has been very busy during the last couple of months. First, they announced MXNT, a stablecoin that is pegged to the Mexican Pesos. A few weeks ago, Tezos celebrated the start of USDT on its blockchain as a valuable addition to its DeFi ecosystem.

Today, Tether announced yet another launch of a new product extending its stablecoin portfolio. GBPT will be pegged to the British Pound Sterling. This will not only allow a faster and cheaper asset transfer but is also an option for investors to get exposure to the British Pound at minimal expense and with worldwide availability.

GBPT is the fifth stablecoin among EURT, which is pegged to the Euro, CHNT pegged to the Yuan, USDT which is the USD stablecoin, and MXNT which was introduced just recently.

Stablecoins are the backbone of the industry

Stablecoins are the backbone of the crypto industry facilitating trades and settling positions of market makers and exchanges on a global level. Issuers like Tether have repeatedly been questioned and even came under scrutiny. The collapse of Terra still weighs heavy on the market but instead of shrinking the stablecoin space is expanding.

Tethers major competitor is launching EUROC at the end of June, a stablecoin that is pegged to the Euro. Its main product, USD Coin (USDC) is closing its distance to Tethers USDT and could become the number 1 stablecoin solution according to its market cap.

It is important for stablecoins to thrive since they represent one of the most important use cases in crypto. They might even replace any plans for CBDCs since they can be regulated and are immediately available providing all advantages of a digital fiat equivalent already. Should the UK indeed become the next big hub in the western crypto space, a tokenized Pound will be needed. It remains to be seen if investors indeed opt for any other stablecoin than USDT or USDC. The US-Dollar is still so dominant that the demand for tokenized Euros or Pounds is very low. It seems that both Circle and Tether have entered a race to ship more products to the market even if they are considered to be a niche.