New statistics reveal that the US crypto activity is high. As the world’s super power and an important economy, their involvement is indeed a stamp of approval. Data collected by DataLight, a cryptocurrency and blockchain analytics firm, put to paper the world’s distribution of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency traders. From what could be collected, it evident that despite analysts accusing the US’s regulator—the SEC, and policy makers of low progress creating and satisfactorily formulating laws around crypto and blockchain, there are roughly four times as many traders in the USA than in Japan according to traffic data tapped from the top 100 popular crypto exchanges.

Crypto Trading Distribution

DataLight reveal that there are 22 million US-based crypto traders with Japan accounting for a paltry 6 million despite the FSA opening up doors earlier. South Korea is third with 5.7 million monthly users while the UK and Russia cap up the top five with 3.8 million and 3.1 million users respectively.

Even so, DataLight goes on to show that citizens from countries as Turkey and Mexico are slowly gravitating towards cryptocurrencies because of volatile fiat.

“Some other countries are embracing crypto-assets in a big way. Three standout countries which may be considerably higher up the list than you might have thought are Turkey, Ukraine and Mexico. The common denominator between these three countries is volatile currencies.”

Adding that:

“A 10% drop in the value of the Lira was accompanied by a marked spike in volumes on Bitcoin exchange LocalBitcoins. This dynamic also likely explains the surprisingly high traffic in Ukraine and Mexico as citizens unsure about the stability of their fiat currencies look for alternative means of storing their value.”

The Case of BitFinex

In other news, the imbroglio around BitFinex is worsening after it was revealed that Tether Limited is not maintaining a 1:1 peg against the USD. Instead, they are somehow practicing a fractional reserve system, holding 74 percent of the total USDT in circulation. Zoe Phillips of law firm Morgan Lewis, in an ongoing legal proceeding—which was confirmed by Stuart Hoegner, a lawyer representing Tether and BitFinex, said “Tether’s reserves of cash and cash equivalents alone (without the line of credit) would cover approximately 74 percent of the outstanding amount of Tether.” She goes on saying “This sort of ‘fractional’ reserving arrangement is similar to how commercial banks work. No bank holds in liquid cash more than a small percentage of depositors’ money.”

This is everything against what Tether Limited claims their asset to be and could end up fast-tracking their solvency, affecting the market in the process. Besides, it could see investors increase calls for audit and release of those findings to the public. If not, then there could be mass migration from USDT to other stable coins and other liquid coins as Bitcoin, Litecoin or Ethereum.