Novaque Research2025-05-08

TRON + USDT = The World’s Informal Dollar Rail

USDT has cemented its dominance on the TRON network, supported by consistent demand and functional utility. As of 2025, TRON hosts around $70 billion in USDT, far exceeding USDC and TUSD, both of which have sharply declined since 2023. This positions TRON as the primary infrastructure for high-volume stablecoin transfers, especially across emerging markets and informal finance systems. USDT transaction activity on TRON now rivals Ethereum, reflecting its growing role in real-world crypto payments. Between 2020 and 2022, usage was led by retail-sized wallets (under $1k and 1k–10k). But post-2023, mid-sized cohorts (10k–1M) have taken the lead, pointing to increasing activity from OTC desks, payment aggregators, and cross-border remittance operators. Institutional wallets holding over $100M remain consistently active, anchoring liquidity on the network. USDC has undergone a major contraction. Since 2022, its supply on TRON has collapsed below $100 million, with transaction volumes, especially from smaller wallets dwindling. This decline likely stems from Circle’s regulatory de-risking strategy, which may intensify as the company eyes a public listing or acquisition. TUSD followed a similar path. Although it saw a brief rise in wallet growth in mid-2023, it failed to maintain traction. Activity among smaller holders has since faded, and larger cohorts have remained flat, highlighting the difficulty of sustaining trust and utility at scale. Rather than a failure, the retreat of USDC and TUSD reflects a natural consolidation around use-case specialization: Ethereum + USDC = regulated, composable finance Solana + USDC/USDT = high-speed DeFi and trading TRON + USDT = borderless, low-cost settlement and remittance