LONDON, March 31 (Reuters) - Tether has let go two senior precious metals traders it hired from HSBC only three months ago, a source with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters on Tuesday.
El Salvador-headquartered Tether cut the roles as spot gold prices headed for their steepest monthly drop since the 2008 financial crisis, pressured by fading expectations of rate cuts and rising energy costs amid the war in Iran.
Tether held about 130 metric tons of physical gold backing its products as of end-2025 with CEO Paolo Ardoino telling Reuters in January that the company also planned to allocate 10%–15% of its own investment portfolio to physical gold.
The two traders were let go this month, the source said. One of the two traders marked their role at Tether as "layoff/position eliminated" on their LinkedIn profile page. The news was first reported by Bloomberg.
Tether did not reply to a Reuters request for comment on the people moves but said that "Tether always strives to operate with a lean team and to continuously optimise our operations.
"We have been building a state of the art gold team that leverages expertise gathered from all of Tether's recent investments, from the gold royalty companies to gold.com investment."
In January, Tether estimated its own investment portfolio at $20 billion with investments in U.S. Treasuries, bitcoin and the tech sector among other assets.
After surging 64% in 2025 and drawing in new buyers — including Tether — bullion hit a record $5,595 a troy ounce in January amid speculative demand.
Gold has fallen 18% since that record high and is down 13% so far in March to $4,579 amid high volatility.
Reporting by Polina Devitt; Editing by Louise Heavens
Source: Reuters