USDT selling on Curve and Uniswap spooks traders during Bitcoin drop.

On Thursday morning, there were indications of concern among traders as millions worth of USDT (tether stablecoins) were being sold off on popular Uniswap and Curve pools. The USDT balances on Curve’s popular 3pool, which is a stablecoin swapping pool consisting of USDT, USDC, and DAI, rose to over 72% early on Thursday. This suggests that traders had exchanged tens of millions of USDT for stablecoins USD coin (USDC) and dai (DAI).

The 3pool on Curve currently holds over $300 million of USDT and nearly $55 million each of dai and usdc. This imbalance suggests that there is an increased preference for DAI and USDC over tether, which was previously observed during Terra’s implosion last May and the collapse of crypto exchange FTX in November, as reported by blockchain.

Tether CTO Paolo Arduino suggested in a tweet that some traders could be looking to “capitalize on the general sentiment” in the broader crypto markets, which has dipped in the past 24 hours.

“Markets are edgy these days, so it’s easy for attackers to capitalize on this general sentiment,” Arduino said. “But at Tether we’re ready as always. Let them come. We’re ready to redeem any amount.”

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Edited by Sam Reynolds.