“US Government Is Going After Tether”

During a recent conversation with Chris Vasquez, the host of the “World Class,” Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse issued a major warning about Tether, the largest stablecoin issuer. 

“The US government is going after Tether. That is clear to me,” he stressed. 

“I view Tether as a very important part of the ecosystem” the Ripple CEO noted. He finds it hard to predict the exact impact that it will have on the ecosystem. 

Tether’s flagship USDT stablecoin is currently valued at $111 billion, according to CoinGecko data.   

Being Ripple’s CEO is “lonely”  

During the conversation, the Ripple CEO recalled that he was exposed to Bitcoin around 2012. However, he was skeptical of the idea that the cryptocurrency could replace banks. This is why Ripple’s approach, which aimed to combine traditional finance with cryptocurrencies, made more sense to him. 

Garlinghouse revealed that he had an opportunity to work at ride-sharing giant Uber, but he realized that this was not going to change his life in a meaningful way. At that point, he was willing to take risks. While communicating with Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen, Garlinghouse became intrigued by the “audacious” concept of the Internet of Value as well as potential use cases for the XRP token.  

At the same time, Garlinghouse, who was promoted to the CEO of Ripple back in 2016, admits that he feels “lonely” at the helm of the company since he does not have peers like he did at Yahoo. 

“I broke down crying” 

Garlinghouse admitted that getting sued by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission marked “a pretty dark time” for Ripple. 

He stressed that Ripple’s employees felt like they were “part of the mission” since the company was transparent about the developments in the legal battle. “It brought us together,” he added. 

Meanwhile, July 13, 2023, the day Ripple scored a partial victory against the SEC, marked the highest high for the company, according to Garlinghouse. “I broke down crying,” he confessed during the conversation.   

Crypto is not going away 

Garlinghouse is convinced that the SEC is not going to succeed in curtailing the crypto industry. The current regulatory pressure will be viewed as merely a bump down the road for the crypto market. 

The Ripple boss says that he could not trade crypto since it is hard for him to predict specific timelines.

Speaking of “black swan” events that could affect the industry, Garlinghouse does not see quantum computing as a potential threat to crypto.