CoinGecko's 2026 RWA Report maps the six largest stablecoin issuers across backing, transparency, regulation, and yield, revealing that the stablecoin market is not one market but two, separated by whether the issuer passes yield to holders and whether its flagship product is compliant with major regulations.
Key Takeaways
Four of six offer no native yield.
Fiat-backed issuers retain interest, DeFi/synthetic pass it through.
GENIUS Act compliant products: USAT (Tether), USDtb (Ethena).
Most regulated issuer: Circle (MiCA EU, conditional OCC US approval).
Broadest regulatory coverage: Paxos (OCC, MiCA, MAS).
The Yield Question Separates the Two Business Models
The four fiat-backed issuers offer no yield to holders not because they cannot but because their business model depends on retaining the interest their reserves earn, and the yield exists: it simply does not reach the person holding the stablecoin. Tether holds cash, cash equivalents, and other assets against USDT and USAT. Circle holds cash and cash equivalents in the Circle Reserve Fund against USDC and EURC. World Liberty Financial and BitGo hold cash and cash equivalents against USD1.
Paxos holds USD-denominated assets against PYUSD, USDP, and USDG. In every case, the reserve earns a return: treasury bills, money market instruments, and cash equivalents all generate yield. That yield accrues to the issuer, not the holder. The stablecoin holder receives price stability and nothing else.
According to Coingecko, Sky and Ethena operate on a different logic entirely. Sky’s USDS is backed by an overcollateralized DeFi model using stablecoins, T-bills, and onchain/OTC crypto lending. Holders who supply USDS receive sUSDS, which carries a variable yield of approximately 3.65%. Ethena’s USDe is a synthetic stablecoin using delta-neutral hedged spot crypto collateral and liquid stables.
Holders who stake USDe into sUSDe receive staking yield and funding yield from the hedging mechanism. Both models are designed to pass returns through to holders rather than retain them. The yield is not a feature added on top of the product: it is the core mechanism of the product itself.
The Regulatory Split and What the Two-Track Strategy Reveals
The table shows a clear regulatory geography. Circle is the most conventionally regulated: MiCA-compliant in the EU and conditionally approved for an OCC trust charter in the US. Paxos carries the broadest multi-jurisdictional coverage: OCC oversight for PYUSD and USDP, MiCA compliance for USDG, and MAS framework alignment. Both Circle and Paxos are building products designed to fit within established regulatory structures in their largest markets.
Tether and Ethena have made the opposite structural choice for their flagship products. Tether’s USDT is the largest stablecoin in the world and explicitly does not align with major regulations, which means the asset that anchors the majority of global crypto trading volume operates outside the frameworks that govern every traditional financial equivalent. Ethena’s USDe is British Virgin Islands-based, a jurisdiction chosen for similar reasons. Both are the largest products in their respective categories, fiat-backed and synthetic, and both operate outside major regulatory frameworks by design.
The two-track strategy visible across multiple issuers, a non-compliant flagship generating volume and a GENIUS Act-compliant secondary product, is not hedging: it is a bet that both regulatory environments will coexist long enough to justify maintaining both. Tether has USAT for GENIUS Act compliance alongside USDT. Ethena has USDtb, also GENIUS Act compliant, alongside USDe. The secondary products are smaller and newer.
They exist not to replace the flagships but to ensure each issuer has a compliant product ready if regulatory pressure forces a transition.
