Key points

  • Sen. Richard Blumenthal asked Cantor Fitzgerald to preserve records and answer questions about its Tether relationship by October 23.
  • The request covers reserve custody, revenue and ownership arrangements, audits, sanctions monitoring and communications involving Howard Lutnick.
  • The letter is an oversight inquiry, not an enforcement action or finding that Cantor Fitzgerald or Tether violated the law.

A Senate request puts the partnership under scrutiny

Sen. Richard Blumenthal has asked Cantor Fitzgerald for documents and detailed answers about the financial firm’s relationship with stablecoin issuer Tether. Blumenthal, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, sent the request to Cantor chairman Brandon Lutnick on October 8. He asked the firm to preserve relevant records and respond by October 23. The letter opens a congressional oversight inquiry; it is not an enforcement action, court ruling or finding that either company broke the law.

What the senator wants to examine

The request seeks a timeline of the partnership, records describing Cantor’s custody of assets backing USDT and information about revenue, fees or ownership interests tied to Tether. It also asks how Cantor evaluates the reserves, whether it has reviewed Tether’s audits or attestations, and what controls it uses to detect sanctions evasion and money laundering. Blumenthal separately requested communications involving Howard Lutnick, the former Cantor chairman who is now U.S. commerce secretary, as well as information about any continuing involvement he may have had with the relationship.

Related reporting: Polygon Adds TRON to Open Money Stack for USDT Payment Flows

The inquiry follows a Democratic staff report

The letter follows a September 28 report issued by Democratic staff of the investigations subcommittee. That report alleged that Iran-linked networks made extensive use of USDT and said Cantor’s role as custodian for a substantial portion of Tether’s reserves warranted closer examination. The report analyzed 846 wallets sanctioned by the United States or Israel and said 84% had transacted in USDT. Those figures and characterizations come from the staff report; they have not been established in a court proceeding.

Tether disputes the implication

Tether has pushed back against the report’s framing. In comments reported by Reuters after the September report, the company said it cooperates with U.S. authorities and had supported the freezing of nearly $550 million in Iran-linked USDT during 2026. The stablecoin issuer has also emphasized that blockchain transactions can be traced and frozen. The new Cantor letter asks the financial firm—not Tether—to explain what it knew, what due diligence it performed and how the partnership’s compliance responsibilities were divided.

Why reserve custody matters

USDT is the world’s most widely used dollar-linked token, and confidence in it depends heavily on the assets held against tokens in circulation. Cantor’s reported role in safeguarding U.S. Treasury securities and other reserves therefore links a traditional Wall Street institution to a major piece of crypto-market infrastructure. That custody arrangement can affect token holders, trading venues and financial institutions that rely on USDT liquidity, even when they have no direct relationship with Cantor. The senator’s questions reach beyond sanctions policy: they also touch on reserve verification, counterparty risk and the governance of a private digital dollar used across exchanges and payment networks.

What happens next

Cantor Fitzgerald has until October 23 to provide the requested material or explain its position. The subcommittee could use the response to seek more documents, hold a hearing or recommend legislation, but the letter does not commit it to any of those steps. The immediate development is narrower: a senior Senate investigator is seeking a documented account of the Cantor–Tether relationship and its compliance safeguards. Any broader conclusion will depend on the evidence the firm supplies and what the committee does next.

Sources

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