From reselling pirated CDs to becoming the operator of the 'world's largest dollar printing machine,' Ardoino's rise is a model of modern financial dark humor.

His path is not just a personal success story, but also a history of the evolution of 'gray arbitrage'—from grassroots hacker to casino house, and finally to the actual controller of the shadow dollar system.

1. Starting Point: Piracy and Fines

In the 1990s, Ardoino roamed the streets of Italy, surviving by selling pirated CDs. It was a time before the internet became widespread, where software was a highly profitable industry, and piracy was a shortcut for 'grassroots entrepreneurship.'

But Microsoft had its eye on him, and he was eventually fined 1 million lira for copyright infringement. For a grassroots vendor, this fine was almost catastrophic.

However, what others learn is 'do not break the law'; what he learned is:

Only those who can control the medium of circulation can dominate the game.

CDs are the medium of information circulation, while dollars are the medium of financial circulation. He internally planted the logic of 'medium is power.'

2. Transformation: The Enlightenment of Casino Business

In the 2000s, he entered the online casino industry.

The essence of the casino is—players exchange cash for chips, which can only circulate within the casino.

As the house, you can both issue chips and set the rules of the game.

The casino provided him with two insights:

Chips ≠ cash, but cash relies on chips for circulation.

The house can never lose.

This set of casino logic later fully mapped onto the design of USDT.

Casino chips = USDT, casino players = the entire crypto world.

3. Acquisition: The Birth of Tether

In 2014, he and his team acquired a little-known company—Tether—for $500,000.

At that time, the concept of stablecoins was almost unheard of, and BTC was the focus of everyone's attention.

No one expected this small investment would later turn into the craziest 'money printer' in financial history.

By 2025, Tether had issued over $127 billion USDT, with a circulation almost equal to that of a medium-sized country's foreign exchange reserves.

From $500,000 to $127 billion, this curve has expanded 250,000 times.

This is not an investment return but a redistribution of new monetary power.

4. Magic: The House + The Money Printer

Tether does not play the traditional 'backed stablecoin' game, but rather a multi-layered arbitrage:

Dollars come in → Buy US Treasuries
Users deposit dollars, and Tether uses that money to buy US Treasuries, earning a risk-free interest spread.

Chips out → Enter the crypto world
Users receive an equivalent amount of USDT, which they can trade, speculate, and transfer in the crypto world.

The house places bets → Free arbitrage
Tether is not just a money printer; it is also a hedge fund. They can use USDT to bet on the market and control liquidity.

In other words:

Tether treats others as chips and itself as the house.

Users are always spinning in the casino, while the real money is made by those issuing the chips.

5. Pattern: The Shadow System of the Dollar

Today, the scale of US Treasuries held by Tether has surpassed that of most emerging market central banks.

This implies a terrifying reality:

Tether is not just a 'dollar substitute' in the crypto world.

It has almost become a shadow dollar system parallel to the Federal Reserve.

All transactions, contracts, and derivatives in the crypto world rely on USDT as the settlement unit.

Yet the underlying issuance rights are held by a hacker who once sold pirated CDs and ran a casino.


6. Ironic Ending

This is a true history of black finance.

A young man fined for piracy eventually becomes the controller of the world's largest 'dollar printing machine.'

He does not rely on technological breakthroughs or state endorsement, but instead uses a set of casino logic to pry open the cracks in the entire financial system.

The conclusion is just one sentence:

In the crypto world, the most valuable is not BTC or ETH, but the 'issuance rights' of USDT.

And this issuance right has been treated as an extension of casino chips from the very beginning.