Tether Unveils Scudo to Restore Gold as a Digital Payment Tool
- Scudo adds a cleaner unit that lets users price and send small gold values easily.
- Tether Gold stays fully backed by vault gold with on-chain ownership checks tools.
- Rising prices and weak markets lifted demand for tokenized gold through 2025 cycle.
Tether on Tuesday announced Scudo, a new unit of account for Tether Gold (XAU₮), as global interest in gold surged to record levels amid inflation fears and market uncertainty. The company said Scudo aims to make gold easier to price and transact digitally while preserving the existing structure and physical backing of XAU₮.
Gold prices increased significantly in 2025, motivated by ongoing inflation worries, uncertainty about interest rates, central banks’ record buying, and the trend towards safe-haven assets.
Spot gold rose above $4,550 in December before easing to around $4,485 in early January 2026, outperforming major asset classes during the year.
By comparison, Bitcoin ended 2025 down about 6%, while the S&P 500 recorded modest gains of just over 16%, according to figures cited by Tether. As gold prices increased, representing small fractions digitally required long decimal values, which reduced clarity and usability for everyday transactions. Could a simpler pricing unit allow gold to function again as a practical medium of exchange?
Denomination Layer
Scudo operates solely as a unit of account and does not introduce a new token, fee structure, or custodial arrangement, Tether said. The company confirmed that Tether Gold remains fully backed by physical gold stored in secure vaults, with ownership verifiable on-chain through its reporting tools.
Standard issuance and redemption fees for XAU₮ remain unchanged, and Scudo carries no recurring charges. Tether said the new unit improves how fractional gold values appear in digital wallets as prices continue to rise.
Through denomination simplification, Scudo enables users to observe and perform smaller transactions of gold without relying on long decimal numbers. The firm characterized the alteration as an improvement of usability instead of a modification of the structure.
Wallet Development Kit
Alongside the Scudo launch, Tether highlighted its Wallet Development Kit, known as WDK, as part of its broader self-custody strategy. WDK enables developers, companies, and AI agents to build self-custodial wallets that operate across devices and operating systems. These wallets support XAU₮, other stablecoins, and Bitcoin, enabling integrated access to multiple digital assets.
Tether said the toolkit lowers technical barriers for businesses seeking to deploy wallets that handle tokenized gold and stablecoins. The company framed WDK as infrastructure designed to support wider adoption of blockchain-based financial tools.
Read More: Tether Expands Bitcoin Holdings With A $800 Million Purchase
Rising Gold Demand
Tether stated that interest in gold-backed tokens increased steadily throughout 2025 as investors sought long-term wealth preservation and portfolio diversification. Tether Gold benefited from the trend, maintaining a leading position in the tokenized gold market during the year.
In just a few months, the market capitalization of XAU₮ doubled by the end of 2025, indicating that demand was growing and gold prices were rising. XAU₮ continues to offer direct exposure to physical gold with no ongoing custodial fees, aside from one-time issuance or redemption costs.
“Gold is once again proving its role as the ultimate store of value alongside Bitcoin,” said Paolo Ardoino. He said XAU₮ made gold digital, while Scudo simplifies pricing and transactions for even the smallest fractions of the asset. Tether added that the Scudo launch aligns with its broader effort to modernize access to traditional stores of value through blockchain-based systems.
