Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino rejected criticism from the Bank for International Settlements that stablecoins cannot serve as trusted payment instruments at scale and that tokenized deposits are superior. Ardoino said stablecoins are fully backed 100% by liquid reserve assets such as Treasury bills, while tokenized bank deposits rely on uninsured bank deposits and typically hold only about 10% in liquid assets. Ardoino said the BIS is concerned that stablecoins could expose weaknesses in the fractional reserve banking model. He argued that if people view fully reserved stablecoins as safer and begin shifting savings away from partially reserved banking products, it could challenge the existing financial system. He described the current moment as a phase of growing public recognition of that contrast.