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Paolo Ardoino

Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Tether

Search every verified Paolo Ardoino interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether and CTO of Bitfinex, has recently discussed the company's expansion into local artificial intelligence, tokenized securities, and Bitcoin-related financial products. In an October 2026 Reddit AMA, he argued that AI should be developed with a "local first" approach, stating that concentrating intelligence in a few companies would be undesirable and that decentralized, locally run models would be more inclusive. He noted that even inexpensive smartphones can run smaller AI models today, and described Tether's QVAC project as a peer-to-peer, encrypted communication stack designed to operate without centralized data centers. Ardoino also addressed Tether's broader financial strategy in interviews from August and September 2026. He said the company invests in gold, Bitcoin, and farmland to hedge against worst-case scenarios, and described Tether's role in creating "decentralized ownership" of U.S. debt through its stablecoin holders. Regarding Bitfinex Securities, which marked its fifth anniversary, he said the goal is to reduce the cost of raising capital for small and medium-sized enterprises through tokenized markets, and he emphasized the importance of building Bitcoin infrastructure before a potential crisis. He also stated that Tether aims to serve populations excluded from traditional financial and AI services, particularly in emerging markets.

Recent appearances

  • Paolo Ardoino on local AI: highlights from the QVAC Reddit AMA

    October 16, 2026 · 📺 Tether

    Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether, answered the community's questions in the QVAC Reddit AMA on 7 October 2026. The video puts 13 of his answers in 7 minutes, each after the question it answers, including who pays for the compute when AI runs locally and whether a cheap phone can run AI today. Read all of Paolo's answers on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/user/QVAC_Offi... QVAC: https://qvac.tether.io/?utm_source=yo... Chapters 0:00 Why should AI be local first? 0:22 Should a few companies own all of AI? 0:38 Why not just run everything in the cloud? 1:04 If AI runs locally, who pays for the power…

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  • Paolo Ardoino: Bitcoin & the Evolution of the Global Financial System

    September 20, 2026 · 📺 Simply Bitcoin

    Paolo Ardoino explains why Bitcoin, commodities, and global capital markets are colliding at a critical moment. He breaks down how Bitfinex Securities is expanding access to commodities, bonds, and securities for underserved communities and developing markets around the world. From China buying gold and geopolitical instability to AI creating on an opportunity for Bitcoin miners, the financial system is changing fast. Bitcoin infrastructure needs to be built before the world desperately needs it. Interview recorded on September 7th, 2026 CHAPTERS: 00:00 – Paolo Ardoino on Bitcoin and Global…

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  • Five years of tokenisation, bitcoin and more with Paolo Ardoino - BC28

    September 16, 2026 · 📺 Bitfinex

    Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether and CTO of Bitfinex, joins Jesse Knutson on Bitcoin Capital to mark five years of Bitfinex Securities and assess the future of tokenised securities and real-world assets (RWA). Bitfinex moved into security tokens five years ago, when Kazakhstan was one of the few jurisdictions offering a regulatory sandbox for the idea. Paolo explains that decision and sets out where he sees the larger opportunity in tokenisation. Bringing listed stocks on-chain improves trading hours and settlement. The harder problem sits on the sell side. Small and medium-sized enterprises in…

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  • Bitcoin and Gold Are the Hedge Against What Comes Next | Paolo Ardoino

    August 30, 2026 · 📺 The Wolf Of All Streets

    #bitcoinnews #Crypto #finance Tether is evolving far beyond its roots as a stablecoin issuer, building a broader financial and technology company around **USDT, U.S. Treasuries, Bitcoin, gold and even farmland**. The conversation covers how its new KPMG audit addresses years of criticism, why Tether is hedging its exposure to the dollar with scarce assets, and how it could eventually become one of the largest buyers of U.S. government debt. It also explores Tether’s long-term bet that **stablecoins will become the native money for AI agents**, in a future where billions of humans and robots…

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  • EXCLUSIVE: Tether’s Big Four Audit Changes Everything Critics Said

    August 14, 2026 · 📺 The Block

    Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino breaks down the audit critics said would never happen - and why it could change the conversation around USDT, reserves, and trust in crypto forever. After years of scrutiny over transparency, Paolo explains how Tether finally cleared the biggest hurdle in the room with a Big Four audit from KPMG US, why the timing mattered, and what the new yearly audit plus quarterly attestations mean for the company and the industry. He also gets candid about the political pressure that made this process harder than it should have been, the accusations Tether keeps facing, and why h…

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  • In 5 Years, 90% of What You Use AI For Will Run on Your Smartphone | Paolo Ardoino, Tether

    August 10, 2026 · 📺 Eye on AI

    Hundreds of billions of dollars are pouring into AI data centers right now, and the CEO of the world's most used digital dollar thinks that bet is going to look very wrong within five years. In this episode, Craig Smith sits down with Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether - the company behind USDT, the world's most widely adopted stablecoin with 573 million users - to discuss QVAC, Tether's open-source platform for running AI directly on smartphones, laptops, and edge devices, without routing through centralized data centers. Ardoino's thesis is direct: within five years, 90% of what ordinary people u…

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  • Paolo Ardoino - Merger or Obsolescence - The Future for Humanity (Stewarding the Flame, Episode 3)

    July 24, 2026 · 📺 The Trajectory with Dan Faggella

    Brain-computer interfaces are often discussed as futuristic gadgets. Paolo Ardoino argues they're something far more important: humanity's best chance of keeping pace with increasingly capable AI. In this installment of the Stewarding the Flame series, the Tether CEO explores why non-invasive BCI could become a practical "co-processor" for the human brain, why thought privacy must be protected through on-device AI, and why refusing to augment ourselves may be a greater risk than embracing the technology. This conversation explores what role human augmentation should play in carrying forward…

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  • NEURA Robotics Executive Talk | Paolo Ardoino (CEO of Tether) on Physical AI

    July 02, 2026 · 📺 NEURA Robotics

    NEURA Robotics founder and CEO David Reger sits down with Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether, for the first episode of the NEURA Executive Talk, a conversation about where intelligence is really heading and why two very different companies are building toward the same future. They get into distributed intelligence, on-edge AI, the coming machine economy, and Europe’s role in shaping the next era of technology, along with one question worth sitting with: if everything you run sits on someone else’s technology, are you really free? The NEURA Executive Talk brings together the people shaping what com…

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  • Opening Remarks by Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether - Paolo Ardoino (IBW 2026)

    June 03, 2026 · 📺 Istanbul Blockchain Week

    Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether, takes the IBW 2026 Main Stage to deliver the opening remarks for Day 2 of Istanbul Blockchain Week 2026. 🎙️ Paolo Ardoino — CEO, Tether Learn more at IBW: https://istanbulblockchainweek.com/ #IBW2026 #ISTANBLOCK #Tether #Web3 #Blockchain #Crypto

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  • Why Owning 1 Bitcoin Could Become Life-Changing with Paolo Ardoino

    May 13, 2026 · 📺 Crypto 101

    Chapters 00:00 - Paolo Ardoino joins the Crypto 101 Podcast 02:00 - From hacker to CTO of Bitfinex 06:30 - Surviving the 2016 Bitfinex hack 10:00 - Why Bitfinex removed trading fees 15:00 - Tokenized securities and emerging markets 20:00 - Why options trading never took off in crypto 24:30 - ETFs, institutions, and Bitcoin self-custody 29:30 - Lightning Network, AI agents, and Bitcoin payments 35:00 - Quantum computing vs Bitcoin explained 40:00 - Why owning 1 Bitcoin could become life-changing Get immediate access to my entire crypto portfolio.. just $1.00 today! Go here to get acc…

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  • DevNTell - Running LLMs Locally – Tether's Paolo Ardoino Reveals Decentralized AI Platform QVAC

    May 07, 2026 · 📺 Developer DAO

    In this episode of DevNTell we are joined by Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether, who will be introducing us to their decentralized AI platform called QVAC. QVAC is Tether’s answer to centralized AI, an entirely new paradigm where intelligence runs privately, locally, and without permission on any device. Viewers of this DevNTell will get to meet Paolo, learn about Tether's approach to local AI (QVAC) and how you can get started using it today! 00:00 Intro 01:12 Meet Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether 03:17 Paolo Origin Story 07:35 Tether's Leap into AI 13:04 The Vision Behind Stable Intelligence 16:04 M…

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  • Paolo Ardoino Keynote: Tether - A Psychohistory Implementation | Bitcoin 2026

    April 28, 2026 · 📺 Bitcoin Magazine

    What if a stablecoin company was actually building the foundation for civilization? In this Bitcoin Conference talk, Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino borrows from Isaac Asimov's Foundation to explain why Tether is investing in Bitcoin, peer-to-peer protocols, self-custodial wallets, and decentralized AI. He breaks down the open-source Resilience Stack: Hole Punch, Keet, WDK, and QVAC SDK and why 4 billion unbanked people are at the heart of the mission. Watch the full keynote and subscribe for more from the Bitcoin Conference. Use code BM10 to get 10% off Bitcoin 2027 Conference in Nashville: https:/…

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Verified interview transcripts

Notable quotes

“Well, savings accounts are extremely rare in the emerging markets. So, people in the emerging markets don't have savings accounts because they don't have bank accounts. The fact that the reason that why they don't have bank accounts is because their average salary is so low that they cannot afford to pay $100 per year in fees to keep a bank account open that would allow them to get maybe US treasuries exposure and al”

“The first one is the fact that tokenization has a broader meaning, right? So people decide to tokenize. Uh so in this moment you could see a lot of efforts to tokenize anything and the low hanging fruit for tokenization is actually the tokenization of Apple shares or Tesla shares or Google shares that is what most of the companies most of the crypto exchanges are focusing on. Basically most of the crypto exchanges ar”

“The benchmark should be what is the efficiency and the cost of a good company that can follow regular requirements to access capital. So, if we just change the transport layer, but for company, let's say a company that generates $10 million or $20 million or like let's say $50 million in revenues per year. If it take a company that is from Buenos Aires and generates $50 million per year and is not in tech, but is for”

“I think I would divide opportunity in two parts. The first one that is the one that sees the highest level of excitement in this moment is let's bring the capital markets on chain. And that's fine. I think it's a very interesting value proposition especially because it would force, first of all, all the traditional finance to trade the 24/7 which never happened before. It would allow traditional finance to move from ”

“We call ourselves the stable company. We need to take in consideration as every single possible scenario. That's why we invest in gold and and and Bitcoin and we also invest in land. ... It's not a game for us. It's a true mission. We need to remain a company that survived to the worst case scenario.”

“The ownership of US treasuries from an antagonistic country is not a great thing for the United States because you have a single decision maker that can press a button and sell hundreds of billions of dollars of US treasuries from one day to another. So we created the decentralized ownership of the US debt with 650 million people that today basically are holding some US treasuries and they will not wake up all togeth”

Other executives at Tether

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