Anchorage Digital has cut 17% of its workforce, The Information reporter Yueqi Yang said on Oct. 2, citing people briefed on the move. The reduction at the federally chartered crypto custodian lands eight months after Tether closed a $100 million strategic equity investment that valued the firm at $4.2 billion.

"Has cut 17% of jobs," Yang posted. Anchorage Digital did not respond to a request for comment by publication time.

The affected teams, locations and operational scope have not been disclosed, leaving open questions about the impact on Anchorage's qualified custody, stablecoin issuance and Atlas settlement operations.

What did the Tether deal change?

The February investment marked Tether's first equity stake in a U.S. digital-asset bank. Anchorage Digital Bank also became the issuer of Tether's USAT stablecoin, a U.S.-focused product the two companies have positioned for compliance with federal stablecoin frameworks.

Anchorage simultaneously launched its first employee tender offer. Staff could sell shares at the $4.2 billion mark rather than the firm raising fresh primary capital. The structure signaled that employee liquidity, not new balance sheet funding, was the deal's priority.

Why does Anchorage's charter matter?

Anchorage operates the first federally chartered crypto custodian in the United States. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency approved the conversion of the company's South Dakota trust company into a national trust bank in January 2021.

That charter underwrites Anchorage's qualified custody service for institutional clients. It also backs the firm's ability to issue stablecoins from a regulated balance sheet, making Anchorage the only stablecoin issuer tied to a national trust bank. Tether cited that structural position when announcing the deal.

What is the Atlas settlement business?

Anchorage has built Atlas as a coordinated multiparty settlement layer. Institutional clients can allocate collateral and route orders to non-custodial exchanges without prefunding trading venues or relocating assets offshore. The product targets institutional desks that want DeFi execution without abandoning qualified-custody frameworks.

The company's product page reports Atlas secured $12.5 billion in collateral as of June 30, 2026. In December 2025, middleware provider BridgePort said Anchorage had selected it to coordinate access to traditional and non-custodial trading venues through Atlas. The integration extended Atlas beyond spot settlement and collateral management into order routing.

Anchorage's competitors are building parallel institutional DeFi on-ramps. Coinbase runs an institutional prime brokerage with spot, derivatives and lending rails. FalconX has expanded its custody and settlement offerings. The cuts arrive as Anchorage attempts to differentiate Atlas on regulatory grounding rather than venue count.

What changes operationally?

The reductions land as Anchorage scales Atlas and absorbs USAT issuance responsibilities. Distribution of the impact across custody, settlement and stablecoin teams will become clearer when Anchorage files personnel disclosures, comments publicly, or confirms which functions the cuts touch.

Anchorage is not alone in trimming headcount. Circle announced in September that CFO Jeremy Fox-Geen will depart by year-end. Coinbase's chief legal officer Paul Grewal said in July he will step down. The pattern indicates broader recalibration across regulated crypto infrastructure providers as the industry heads into a year defined by stablecoin competition and bank-led tokenization.