Telegram has added a new feature enabling users to send each other the world’s largest stablecoin, tether (USDT).

USDT runs on several blockchains, but for now, Telegram has added support for the stablecoin only on Tron.

• According to an update on March 22nd, USDT-TRON – TRC20 – has been added to the popular messaging app’s wallet function, thereby expanding its payment capabilities for buying and selling crypto.
• USDT is the third crypto-asset joining Bitcoin and The Open Network token as assets supported by the Wallet bot (TON).
• Telegram’s announcement read,

“You can now buy, swap, and make P2P trades with Tether USDT (TRC20). You can also directly send USDT to your friends with no transaction fees.”

• With the new integration, Telegram is competing against other social media platforms, such as Twitter, which already added support for tips in Bitcoin and Ethereum in 2021, in addition to its partnership with Stripe to add payment features via the USDC stablecoin.
• Telegram’s tryst with crypto dates back to 2018, when it launched its Telegram Open Network (TON), which was initially designed to be a proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain platform with a native token with the aim to generate payments on its chat app. The launch, however, was not smooth.
• The app founder and CEO of the app – Pavel Durov – previously said he had to face numerous scammers and fake accounts on Twitter.
• Subsequently, the project was abandoned by Telegram just two years later after the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) deemed the initial coin offering illegal, which forced Telegram to step away from the TON project and hand it over to the TON Foundation.
• Last November, DWF Labs announced a commitment to deploy $10 million to support the TON ecosystem.