Author: Tron
On June 11, Justin Sun, the founder of TRON, announced on X (Twitter) that the stablecoin USD1 has been officially minted on the TRON chain. Subsequently, Eric Trump, the second son of the former US President, also confirmed this on X and thanked TRON for supporting USD1.
This was not unexpected, as early in early May, Justin Sun and Eric Trump had already mentioned in Dubai that the US dollar stablecoin USD1 issued by WLFI would be natively launched on the TRON chain. Previously, USD1 had been issued on Ethereum and BSC, but those two chains were more like trial runs, with the TRON chain being the real stablecoin battlefield.
Why must USD1 choose TRON?
It's understandable that USD1 was issued on Ethereum, which, although declining, is still the blockchain network with the largest total value locked (TVL) and dominates the DeFi field. Its issuance on BSC was mainly due to Binance's $2 billion financing, which chose USD1 as a payment method. In actual transfer usage, USD1's transaction volume on both chains is not large, with most of it currently on BSC, hence slightly higher transaction volume.
(USD1 transaction volume on Ethereum chain)
(USD1 transaction volume on BSC chain)
In Dubai, Justin Sun stated: "The integration of USD1 will bring new vitality to the TRON ecosystem, and our goal is to enable every user to easily use stablecoins via mobile phone and participate in the global financial system." He also pointed out that this collaboration with WLFI marks a key step in the fusion of DeFi and traditional finance, hoping to leverage USD1 to enable global users to seamlessly use stablecoins in daily life.
TRON's future vision and mission is to build a metaverse financial free port, allowing eight billion people worldwide to achieve financial freedom. This is also one of the reasons why TRON has surpassed Ethereum to become the largest USDT issuance network. TRON's development vision is naturally suited to the stablecoin ecosystem, a gene not possessed by other public chains, so TRON and USD1 are highly aligned in operational direction, which is the first reason why USD1 must choose TRON.
The second reason is that USD1 can engage in good dialogue with TRON founder Justin Sun, and both parties can collaborate and communicate. This doesn't mean USD1 cannot dialogue with other public chain founders, but in the business realm, other public chain founders lack this advantage, such as the very low probability of Vitalik intersecting with Trump.
Previously, Justin Sun has purchased Buffett's lunch, graced Forbes' cover, and attended Trump's dinner as the first guest, all of which are accumulations of commercial influence or goodwill, not mere marketing. Once Justin Sun's influence in the US business world reaches a certain level, such collaboration becomes natural. In other words, USD1's union with TRON is actually the best combination of two parties with shared will and the ability to maximize cooperation effects.
Large US dollar stablecoins with political brands cannot develop deep cooperation with completely unfamiliar public chains. Bitcoin can serve as a US strategic reserve, but stablecoins have not yet reached a fully decentralized stage, and operating stablecoins is highly profitable. Only when centralized stablecoins are strong enough and widely accepted can decentralized stablecoins have greater development space.
Some people have a misunderstanding about the USD1 and TRON collaboration. Previously, Justin Sun and TRON collectively subscribed to 75 million USD worth of WLFI tokens, becoming the project's largest investor. He is also the largest holder of Trump's MEME token TRUMP and attended Trump's dinner on May 22 as the first guest, even being invited to speak. This led some to believe that USD1's quick launch on the TRON chain was solely due to Justin Sun's massive financial investment, as if money could facilitate such collaboration. However, this view completely overlooks TRON's own strength - without genuine technical advantages and ecosystem value, can mere financial investment truly attract top-tier stablecoin projects?
The third and most important reason is that TRON has already become the main battlefield for stablecoins. Tether's USDT stablecoin is the world's largest, maintaining a market share above 70% since mid-2023. The largest USDT issuance network is TRON, and according to current defillama data, USDT issued on TRON accounts for 50.16%, leading Ethereum by nearly 10%.
(USDT network distribution as of June 13)
Currently, USDT's market cap is around $156 billion, while USD1 is only $2.1 billion, representing just 1.3% of USDT. However, in terms of growth speed, since USD1's launch in March, its circulation has exceeded 2 billion in less than 3 months. In comparison, USDT took about 5 years to reach this milestone, and USDC about 2 years (September 2020). Achieving this in such a short time demonstrates USD1's strong momentum. Compared to USDT, USD1 has enormous competitive space and will inevitably increase its issuance volume, and clearly only the TRON network, which already carries large-scale USDT stablecoins, can meet USD1's demands.
Regarding TRON network performance, no further elaboration is needed. Customer recognition is the best proof - if the TRON network truly had high fees and poor experience, why would the world's largest stablecoin issuer, Tether, continue to choose to increase USDT issuance on the TRON network?
The First Stablecoin with a Political Brand: USD1
USD1 is a US dollar stablecoin launched by World Liberty Financial (WLFI), currently with a total scale of approximately $2.187 billion. Its reserve assets include short-term US Treasury bonds, US dollar deposits, and other cash equivalents, regularly audited by third-party accounting firms to ensure 100% reserve support. USD1's compliant custody is provided by BitGo, the world's largest independent qualified custody institution.
It is well known that World Liberty Financial Inc. (WLFI) is a DeFi platform controlled by members of the Trump family, and the stablecoin it issues is naturally closely related to the Trump family. Therefore, USD1 is currently the only centralized stablecoin with a national brand background, which is unprecedented.
The timing of USD1's launch is also very clever. In February this year, the GENIUS Act was first proposed by legislators, and on March 25, WLFI officially announced the launch of the USD1 stablecoin, deploying it on-chain in April. On May 6, USD1 was first listed on the major exchange HTX, and on May 19, the US Senate passed the GENIUS Act with 66 votes in favor and 32 against, marking the first federal regulatory framework for stablecoins.
USD1's launch is highly synchronized with the stablecoin bill. The bill is still in the approval stage, but USD1 has begun to be implemented. This tight rhythm suggests an extremely high probability of the bill's final approval and will bring significant benefits to the stablecoin market. It is precisely because of this that USD1's layout can be so swift.
After USD1's official launch, stablecoin competition will transition from a wild era to a stage of more compliant and larger capital institutions, and in this transformation, TRON will play a crucial role.
Summary
With the imminent implementation of the GENIUS Act and the Trump family's launch of USD1, the stablecoin market will usher in a new wave of competition. Reports from SWIFT and VISA both indicate that stablecoins are expected to become an important part of the future global payment system. This means that stablecoins' functionality may upgrade from intermediaries in cryptocurrency transactions to core channels for global transfer payments, which could become the key growth point for the stablecoin market in the next phase.
Currently, TRON has become the largest issuance network for USDT, demonstrating its strong market capabilities. The addition of USDC is not only an inevitable trend but will also create shared development opportunities for both parties in future competition.
