Tether International has completed its first full financial statement audit, with KPMG U.S. issuing an unqualified opinion on the stablecoin issuer's accounts for the year ended December 31, 2025. USDT, the token Tether issues, is the largest stablecoin by market capitalization, making the audit a notable step for a company whose reserves have drawn years of scrutiny from regulators, analysts and market participants.

The KPMG audit covered Tether International's balance sheet, income statement, changes in equity and cash flows, including the assets held in reserve against issued tokens and the liabilities represented by those tokens. KPMG said the statements fairly presented the company's financial position in all material respects under U.S. GAAP.

The milestone completes a process Tether began in March, when it appointed a Big Four firm for its first full independent audit. At that time, the auditor had not been publicly identified. The engagement brings Tether closer to the standard set by Circle, issuer of USDC, which has published audited financial statements, and comes amid intensifying global stablecoin regulation including the EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets framework and proposed federal stablecoin legislation in the United States.

KPMG Examines Reserves, Transactions and Gold Holdings

The audit went beyond Tether's existing quarterly reserve attestations by reviewing transactions, ownership records, valuations, counterparties, systems and supporting documentation across the company's financial statements.

KPMG also physically inspected and counted each gold bar held by Tether, checking identifying information for the bullion rather than relying only on custodian records. Tether has become a major private gold holder after building its physical position toward 150 tonnes during 2026.

Tether's audited 2025 accounts showed reserves exceeding liabilities by $6.814 billion. That figure predates the company's latest quarterly balance sheet, which showed a $4.11 billion reserve buffer at the end of June 2026 and about $184.6 billion of USDT in circulation.

Audit Replaces Years of Attestation-Only Reporting

Tether has published independent reserve attestations for years, most recently through BDO. Those reports examine reserve information at a specific reporting date rather than the company's complete annual financial statements. Critics have long argued that point-in-time attestations provide less assurance than full audits because they do not evaluate internal controls, transactions over a full period, or the completeness of financial statements under professional audit standards.

By contrast, the KPMG engagement subjects the wider financial accounts to audit procedures under professional standards and produces an audit opinion on the financial statements as a whole. An unqualified opinion is issued when an auditor concludes the statements are fairly presented without a qualified exception or adverse finding.

The completed audit also comes as Tether narrows some peripheral products while expanding its core reserve and tokenization businesses. The company recently began winding down aUSD₮ and the Alloy platform while keeping USDT and Tether Gold at the center of its financial operations.

Tether Puts KPMG Name Behind Reserve Accounts

Paolo Ardoino said the completed audit responds to years of criticism over whether Tether could undergo the same level of financial scrutiny applied to large conventional companies.

The audit applies specifically to Tether International, S.A. de C.V., the entity whose financial statements and token-related reserves were examined, rather than serving as a blanket audit of every company or business within the wider Tether group.

Tether said more than 650 million users now use USDT globally, while its audited 2025 accounts closed with reserves exceeding liabilities by $6.814 billion.