Lately, discussions about stablecoins have been heating up again. People say “1:1 pegging” out loud, but if even a little gust of trouble blows in, they’ll press the withdraw button first… To put it plainly, when stablecoins de-peg, it’s often not that the ledger breaks first—it’s that people’s nerves and confidence get squeezed, and they queue up to redeem. Reserve transparency is also pretty subtle: even if reports are issued diligently, ordinary people still can’t really make sense of them. In the end, it turns into an emotional game of “whether I believe you or not.”

After I was once educated about exit paths through the NFT secondary market, I’ve been a bit neurotic about getting out. Stablecoins are the same. When nothing goes wrong in day-to-day life, everything is fine. But once on-chain transfers get stuck and redemption turns into a line, that’s when you realize you’re not holding “dollars”—you’re holding “promises.” Recently, the whole arrangement of stacking yields again by re-pledging and “sharing security” has been criticized as “nesting dolls.” I can understand that too: once the underlying assets get tight, no matter how many layers of wrapping you put on them outside, you can’t save confidence. Anyway, I’d rather have a bit less return in exchange for peace of mind. That’s where I’m at for now.