Stablecoin Attestations: How to Read the Reports

What an attestation is

A stablecoin attestation is a report an accounting firm signs about a statement an issuer makes. The issuer commissions the work. The firm performs procedures. It states what it examined. It expresses a conclusion. The conclusion attaches to the stated claim. It never attaches to the company as a whole ^[1].

One engagement detail teaches the structure. The Tether report of record is engaged by a fund entity, not by the operating company ^[2]. Who commissions a report is part of the report. Readers who know to look for it read the rest of the document differently.

The tiers, from the top

Assurance comes in tiers. The tier names come from the reports’ own language, not from marketing. At the top of what this corpus holds sits reasonable assurance under ISAE 3000 Revised.

The Tether report states its own engagement. The firm was engaged “to perform a reasonable assurance engagement” on the reserves report. The criteria it complied with are stated in the document ^[2].

One step over in form sits the examination. Its standard comes from the AICPA. The Circle report names it in its own words: the work was “conducted in accordance with attestation standards established by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants” ^[1]. The opinion attaches to management’s assertion. It does not attach to the company ^[1].

Below that sits limited assurance. Its conclusion is negative in form. One live report in the corpus states it plainly. “Nothing has come to our attention” that the reserves report is misstated, it says. Its own disclaimer adds: “our work is substantially less in scope than an audit.”

Two further forms exist in this corpus. Proof-of-reserves demonstrations show controlled addresses holding stated assets. They verify points in time, nothing wider. Custodian attestations cover assets a custodian holds. They speak monthly, in the custodian’s own words.

None of these is an audit

The demand layer keeps asking for a stablecoin’s “real audit.” The document-level answer is dated and plain. No audit document exists in any corpus this site holds. No assertion either way beyond that record. The largest issuer’s latest document is the BDO Italia report on its Q2 2026 figures ^[2]. It carries reasonable assurance. That is the record. The distinction between it and an audit is the education.

The distinction matters in one direction only. An audit of financial statements examines the statements as a whole, under auditing standards. Everything in the tier list above examines a stated claim under attestation standards. A stronger-sounding word on a document does not move it up the ladder. This site uses each tier’s own name everywhere it appears ^[1].

Walk a real report, anchor by anchor

The Circle July 2026 examination teaches the reading skill on eight anchors ^[1].

The title block names the instrument. It is an independent accountants’ report. The scope sentence names the claim examined. The claim is about fair value. Reserve assets must equal or exceed USDC in circulation. The scope names two report dates, 8 July and 31 July 2026 ^[1]. The standards paragraph names the rules the firm followed. The responsibility paragraph splits the work. Management is responsible for its assertion. The firm’s responsibility is an opinion on that assertion ^[1].

Then the opinion, in the report’s own words: management’s assertion “is fairly stated, in all material respects” ^[1]. Then the table, which carries both dates side by side. Circulation read 73,083,964,102 on 8 July. It read 71,826,453,410 on 31 July. Fair value read 73,160,228,798, then 71,904,101,332 ^[1]. A report that carries two dates tells you both moved inside one month. The last anchors are the boundaries. One states what the firm did not examine. One carries the execution formalities, including the management assertion’s signing date of 27 August 2026 ^[1].

The issuer table, in brief

Every covered issuer in this library carries its own row, verified per report. The two majors lead it. Tether publishes quarterly, with BDO Italia at the reasonable assurance tier ^[2]. Circle publishes monthly, with Deloitte at the examination tier ^[1]. Around them sit the rest. Some run monthly examination programs. One runs a limited-assurance program that still carries a draft flag. One runs a proof-of-reserves program. One runs custodian attestations. And one protocol has no attestation model at all. Its design is on-chain verification. Each token page carries its issuer’s row with the report itself.

Auditor facts are facts about dated reports. They are never standing biographies. Firms change, and the changes are part of the record. This corpus holds dated transitions at three issuers. The watchword: any new signer on a new report updates the row.

The phrasing rules that ride every panel

Two rules travel with every attestation mention on this site. First, “fully backed” means reserve assets at or above tokens outstanding. It never means one hundred percent bank cash. Composition is published category by category, and the categories are the content ^[1]. Second, the tier name is stated verbatim everywhere it appears. The names run from reasonable assurance down to custodian attestation. The names are the difference ^[2].

Where to verify

The USDT page and the USDC page hold each issuer’s figures with their dates. The comparison page sets the two programs side by side. The safety framework uses the tier names as one of its six checks, and the stablecoins hub frames the pillar.