Terra's Algorithmic Dollar-Pegged Crypto UST Is Now the Third-Largest Stablecoin

The algorithmic stablecoin stemming from the Terra (LUNA) network has become the third-largest stablecoin token in terms of market capitalization at $17.54 billion. As of today, UST’s market capitalization has surpassed the BSC-based stablecoin BUSD by more than $67 million.

Stablecoin Terrausd Surpasses BUSD’s Market Valuation

There’s a new leader in the world of stablecoins, as Terra’s dollar-pegged algorithmic cryptocurrency now commands the third-largest stablecoin position, in terms of overall market valuation. Statistics indicate that terrausd’s (UST) issuance increased by 14.9% over the last month and currently the stablecoin has a market cap of around $17.54 billion. The stablecoin has managed to surpass BUSD, which currently has a market cap of around $17.47 billion on Monday, April 18, 2022.

The milestone also means UST is the largest decentralized stablecoin under two centralized stablecoin behemoths. It is well known that the centralized stablecoin tether (USDT) is the largest stablecoin today, with a market capitalization of around $82.6 billion. The second-largest stablecoin market valuation is held by usdcoin (USDC) which has a $49.8 billion capitalization at the time of writing.

While Terra’s UST is the third largest, it only represents 21.23% of USDT’s overall value. However, Terra’s UST represents 35.22% of USDC’s market cap today. In terms of market cap size today, UST is valued at over $67 million higher than BUSD, which is also a centralized stablecoin. BUSD’s reserve assets are held by the digital currency company Paxos, while the algorithmic stablecoin UST is created via a burning process using the Terra network.

UST is essentially created by burning a single U.S. dollar’s worth of terra (LUNA), the Terra network’s native crypto asset. Other types of decentralized stablecoin projects like Makerdao’s DAI leverage an over-collateralization process to keep the token pegged to the value of one USD. Terra’s stablecoin UST has grown exponentially during the last 509 days or 16 months. On November 25, 2020, UST had a circulating supply of 13.2 million coins and since then, the UST supply has increased by 132,504%.