How many people who didn’t invest directly in CDOs or subprime mortgages were affected by the Great Recession in 2008?
Tether (or a substitute stablecoin) is currently a requirement for lots of the Wall Street investment in cryptocurrencies. If it turns to poo, lots of that Wall Street investment does too and it creates huge liquidity/ volume issues.
"Then, this year, Tether Holdings started putting out a huge amount of digital coins. There are now 69 billion Tethers in circulation, 48 billion of them issued this year. That means the company supposedly holds a corresponding $69 billion in real money to back the coins—an amount that would make it one of the 50 largest banks in the U.S., if it were a U.S. bank and not an unregulated offshore company."
A Tether crash would take down a lot of stuff.
Everyone who holds Tether is holding Tether’s bag. If you don’t own tether, this doesn’t directly affect you. Most of the people I know don’t own (and have never owned) Tether.