Tether blacklisted four THORChain vault addresses on the Tron network on October 9, 2026. This action froze approximately 1.45 million USDT and immediately halted Tron-based cross-chain swaps and liquidity-provider operations on the protocol.
THORChain co-founder Chad Barraford stated that the team received no prior notification from Tether regarding the freeze. The protocol, which allows users to trade native assets across different blockchains, relies on these vaults to manage pooled assets for swaps.
While the frozen amount represents a portion of the total liquidity secured by THORChain, which stands at approximately $47.9 million, the incident has suspended services for users relying on the Tron route. No timeline for service restoration has been provided.
Tether utilizes an addBlackList function in its TRC-20 contract to restrict address activity, a mechanism it has applied to over 11,000 addresses throughout its history. Unlike typical freezes targeting individual wallets, this action impacted shared protocol infrastructure.
The freeze follows a decision by THORChain in late September not to block addresses linked to the $387.5 million Bitget hack. It remains unconfirmed whether this event influenced Tether's decision to blacklist the vaults.
