Tether's Black Box

Lyrics

[Intro]

[Verse 1]
They built a house on the internet, said it was safe as stone.
A digital dollar for a digital age, a place to stand alone.
With the market screaming up and down, a wild rollercoaster ride.
They promised you a quiet room, with nothin' left to hide.
"Always one hundred percent backed," it said, right there in black and white.
Every single token worth a dollar, day and night.

[Verse 2]
But the questions started comin', like a slow and steady rain.
Folks asked to see inside the vaults, again and then again.
The company was registered where the warm trade winds all blow.
The British Virgin Islands... a place you don't want folks to know.
They'd show a letter from a lawyer, a statement from a bank.
But a real look at the balance sheet, always drew a blank.
An "attestation," not an audit. A promise, not a proof.
Just a man in a good suit, standin' on a leaky roof.

[Chorus]
It's a black box, humming in the dark.
You feed it faith and dollars and you leave your trusting mark.
A number on a screen says it's equal, says it's true.
But what's inside that black box... they'll never show me and you.

[Verse 3]
The Attorney General of New York, a woman named Letitia James,
She pulled the files and read the lines and called them on their games.
Found an eight-hundred-million-dollar hole, patched up on the sly.
With reserves that weren't reserves, beneath an empty sky.
Said they "recklessly and unlawfully" sold the world a lie.
And the fines came down from Washington, as the truth went stumbling by.
The backing wasn't dollar bills, but bonds and loans and notes.
And commercial paper from somewhere, on barely floating boats.

[Bridge]
And now the whole casino leans on this one single chip.
The engine of the crypto trade, on every screen and lip.
If that box should ever open, if the light should ever shine...
On empty shelves and broken words, what happens to your dime, and mine?

[Chorus]
It's just a black box, humming in the dark.
You feed it faith and dollars and you leave your trusting mark.
A number on a screen says it's equal, says it's true.
But what's inside that black box... they'll never show me and you.

[Outro]
No, what's inside that black box...
They'll never tell you.