Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino is responding to S&P Global Ratings after the firm lowered its stability rating on its stablecoin USDT.

In a post on X, Ardoino tells S&P that Tether wears its loathing with pride, saying classical rating models were built for legacy financial institutions and have historically guided investors toward firms that later collapsed.

S&P says its the rating is due to increased exposure to riskier assets in Tether’s reserves, including Bitcoin, gold, corporate bonds, and secured loans.

It also notes limited public disclosure about the creditworthiness of custodians, counterparties and reserve-holding entities, Reuters reports.

Ardoino argues that those failures pushed regulators to question the independence and objectivity of major rating agencies.

“To S&P regarding your Tether rating: We wear your loathing with pride.

The classical rating models built for legacy financial institutions, historically led private and institutional investors to invest their wealth into companies that despite being attributed investment grade ratings collapsed pushing worldwide regulators to challenge such models, the independence and objective assessment of all major rating agencies.

The traditional finance propaganda machine is growing worried when any company tries to defy the force of gravity of the broken financial system. No company should dare to decouple itself from it.”

Ardoino maintains that Tether’s structure and reserves demonstrate resilience and says the company’s model challenges assumptions held by traditional finance.

“Tether instead built the first overcapitalized company in the financial industry, with no toxic reserves. And yet is and remains extremely profitable. Tether is living proof that the traditional financial system is so broken that it’s becoming feared by the emperors with no clothes.”