The XAUT payment gateway for gold-settled commerce

Why accept XAUT

XAUT (Tether Gold) is a token backed one-to-one by physical gold. It is the easiest way for a merchant to take a payment that settles in gold rather than in a fiat-pegged stablecoin — and, by market cap, the largest tokenized-gold token in circulation . One XAUT corresponds to one troy ounce of allocated London Good Delivery gold bullion, stored in a Swiss vault, with the serial numbers of the underlying bars published by Tether on a per-holder basis.

For a merchant, this is a different value proposition from USDT or USDC. You aren't accepting a dollar-equivalent — you're accepting an exposure to gold spot price. That makes XAUT useful for a specific kind of business: precious-metals dealers, luxury goods, jewelers, art and collectibles, private wealth services, and any merchant whose customer base wants to settle large invoices in something other than fiat.

Paymos accepts XAUT on Ethereum mainnet, the canonical chain where Tether issued the token. Settlement is one-to-one — XAUT in, XAUT on your balance, no auto-conversion to dollars.

What XAUT actually is

XAUT is issued by TG Commodities Limited, a Tether group entity registered in the British Virgin Islands. Every XAUT in circulation is backed one-to-one by allocated, physical, London Good Delivery (LGD) gold bullion stored in a high-security vault in Switzerland.

The mechanics that distinguish XAUT from a fiat-pegged stablecoin like USDT:

• One XAUT = one fine troy ounce of physical gold. Not a claim against a pool, not a synthetic exposure — a defined troy ounce of allocated metal. Holders of 430+ XAUT (one full LGD bar) can request physical redemption from Tether, delivered as a numbered bar with provenance documentation.
• Allocated, not unallocated. The gold is identifiable per holder by bar serial number, published on Tether's verification page. This is the same distinction that separates a London bullion bank's allocated account from a paper-claim ETF holding.
• Tether publishes the bar serials. A holder can verify on Tether's site that specific bars correspond to their balance. This level of vault transparency is unusual in the tokenized gold space, and helped XAUT and PAXG between them take the large majority of the tokenized-gold market .
• Storage and insurance are folded into the token economics. Tether absorbs vault storage and insurance costs from its broader operations — there is no annual storage fee charged to XAUT holders, in contrast to most ETF gold products which deduct roughly 0.25-0.40% annually .

XAUT trades at the spot gold price, plus a small premium for the convenience of digital transferability. Its value moves tick-for-tick with bullion, up and down. That is the point — gold exposure with the operational benefits of an ERC-20 token.

Networks where XAUT lives on Paymos

XAUT is issued natively on Ethereum mainnet (ERC20, 6 decimals) — the single network in the panel above. A bridged version (branded XAUt0) reached TON after Tether's April 2024 expansion to that chain , but it is small in volume, and Tether has not issued canonical XAUT on EVM L2s or other non-EVM chains. The volume that matters for merchant flows is overwhelmingly on Ethereum, which is what we accept.

Why no L2 support

The gold-backed segment is dominated by holders with large balances who care about the link between the on-chain token and the named physical bar. Bridging the token through a third-party wrapper would break that link — your bridged-XAUT would be a claim against the bridge, not against a specific gold bar. We accept only canonical Ethereum-native XAUT to preserve the redemption story.

XAUT vs fiat-backed stablecoins

XAUT is not interchangeable with USDT, USDC, or USD1. The relevant comparison is whether you want to take a payment that holds its dollar value (stablecoin) or holds its gold value (XAUT).

Dimension	XAUT	USDT/USDC
Underlying	One troy ounce physical gold	One US dollar
Price behaviour	Tracks gold spot	Tracks USD (~$1)
Redemption	Physical bar from Swiss vault (430+ XAUT minimum)	Wire of USD (institutional / Circle Mint)
Storage cost to holder	None	None
Typical use case	Precious-metals dealers, luxury, treasury hedge	Routine commerce
Volatility	Same as gold	Negligible (peg)

A merchant accepting both gets a useful split: routine invoices settle in dollar-stable tokens, premium-priced or store-of-value invoices settle in XAUT. Customers self-select at checkout based on which exposure they prefer to release.

Pricing and integration

XAUT costs the same 1.0% all-in standard rate as every other Paymos token, blockchain gas included. High-volume merchants can request a lower rate through operator review. Full breakdown: pricing page.

Integration: pass currency: "XAUT" to POST /v1/invoices. XAUT on Paymos lives only on Ethereum mainnet, so network is ERC20 either way. The widget SDK accepts a fiat currency field and lets the customer pick XAUT at checkout from the set you've enabled. Code samples in eight languages and the full schema sit in the API docs.

CMS plugins shipped: WooCommerce, WHMCS, OpenCart 4. Enable XAUT in the gateway settings and it appears alongside the other tokens you accept.

XAUT-specific edge cases

Gold price volatility is your exposure now

A merchant invoicing in USD who accepts XAUT receives a balance whose dollar value moves with gold. If gold rises 5% between invoice receipt and withdrawal-to-fiat, your effective revenue rises 5%. If gold falls 5%, your revenue falls 5%. This is a feature for some businesses (gold dealers, jewellers, anyone whose cost base is gold-linked) and a risk for others (typical fiat-revenue businesses). If you are not comfortable with gold price risk, pair XAUT with same-day withdrawal to spot via an exchange that lists XAUT — as of mid-2026, Bitfinex and a handful of others quote XAUT/USD directly .

Minimum redemption threshold for physical delivery

Holders of fewer than 430 XAUT (one full LGD bar, since bars are not subdivided in vault) cannot redeem to physical metal. Below that threshold, the path to a fiat realisation is XAUT → USDT or XAUT → USD on a venue that lists the pair. For a merchant who routinely accepts XAUT in smaller increments, plan for an exchange-based realisation step rather than physical delivery.

Tax treatment differs from stablecoin

In most jurisdictions, gold is taxed as a commodity (or as a collectible), not as currency. Receiving 5 XAUT for a sale is treated for accounting and tax purposes as taking delivery of 5 troy ounces of gold — not as receiving $X of revenue. Your bookkeeping should reflect that. Consult a tax adviser in your jurisdiction; Paymos does not provide tax advice.

Centralized issuer with a blacklist function in the contract

XAUT's contract includes a blacklist function — Tether maintains the same compliance posture across its tokens . Blacklisting against an ordinary merchant address is extremely rare; the mechanism exists for sanctions and court-ordered seizure cases. The deeper risk for an XAUT holder is operational — what happens if TG Commodities itself failed and the Swiss vault contents were tied up in administration. The structural answer is that the gold is allocated and segregated, so a recovery for token holders is a reasonable expectation; the operational answer is that you should treat large XAUT balances with the same diligence you would a large allocated-gold ETF holding.

Premium positioning matters

Most retail crypto checkouts bury XAUT, because the audience that spends gold is small. Paymos surfaces it only when you switch it on. A high-net-worth buyer reads a checkout offering USDT, USDC, and XAUT differently from one offering USDT alone — it tells them you understand how they hold value. Enabling it adds nothing to your rate.

See also

XAUT pairs cleanly with USDT and USDC — give customers a dollar-stable choice for routine invoices and a gold-settled choice for premium-priced inventory. For decentralized-stablecoin commerce, DAI is the counterpart in the same way XAUT is the counterpart to fiat-backed tokens.

Frequently asked questions

Is one XAUT really backed by one troy ounce of gold?

Yes — one fine troy ounce of London Good Delivery gold per XAUT in circulation, allocated and stored in a Swiss vault. Tether publishes the underlying bar serial numbers on its verification page, which is unusual transparency for a tokenized-asset product. The bullion is auditable by holders.

Can I redeem XAUT for physical gold?

Yes, but only at the bar threshold. The minimum redemption is one full London Good Delivery bar — around 430 troy ounces (XAUT), since bars are not split in the vault. Below that, sell on an exchange that lists XAUT for USDT or USD. Redemption carries a 25-basis-point fee on the gold price at the time of redemption, plus delivery cost, with the bar shipped to a location of the holder's choosing .

How does XAUT compare to a gold ETF like GLD?

GLD holds gold in vaults on behalf of shareholders, with an annual fee (~0.40% expense ratio) deducted from net asset value . XAUT holds gold on behalf of token holders with no recurring storage fee, but is issued by a private offshore entity rather than a SEC-registered fund. The custody story is similar in spirit; the issuer's regulatory footprint is very different. For institutional treasury XAUT is more operationally flexible (no securities-account custody needed); GLD is more familiar to traditional finance.

What happens to XAUT during gold price volatility?

XAUT tracks gold spot closely — when gold moves, XAUT moves. The token does not have a stable peg in the way USDT does. Merchants should plan their accounting around this: receiving 1 XAUT is taking gold exposure, not dollar exposure. If you want to lock the dollar value, swap to USDT or USDC immediately on receipt.

Is XAUT available on networks other than Ethereum?

A bridged version (branded XAUt0) reached TON after Tether's April 2024 expansion to that chain , but volume is small. Paymos accepts the canonical Ethereum mainnet XAUT only — this is where merchant-relevant volume sits and where the redemption story is cleanest.

Why is XAUT priced higher than the gold spot price sometimes?

XAUT typically trades at a small convenience premium to spot, reflecting the operational advantage of holding a transferable token rather than physical bars . The premium varies with secondary-market liquidity and rises when spot demand is high. For a merchant the practical impact is mild; for an arbitrageur the premium is the main signal.

Can a customer pay me in XAUT from an exchange?

Yes. Exchanges that list XAUT (Bitfinex, OKX, and a growing list) support direct withdrawal to an external Ethereum address. The customer initiates withdrawal, the funds land in your invoice's deposit address, and Paymos credits your balance once confirmed. Withdrawal fees are paid by the customer.

How do I sell XAUT for fiat?

Move the balance to an exchange that lists XAUT/USDT or XAUT/USD (Bitfinex is the primary venue), sell at market, withdraw the resulting USDT or fiat through your usual channels. For sales above a single LGD bar threshold (430 XAUT), physical redemption from Tether is an alternative path — generally only relevant for very large holdings.

Should I enable XAUT alongside USDT and USDC?

If your business touches gold-conscious customers — precious-metals dealers, jewellers, luxury goods, art, wealth management — yes. It carries no extra fee, it tells those buyers you speak their language, and customers self-select at checkout. For a typical SaaS or B2B merchant whose audience has no gold-buying behaviour, XAUT is a nice-to-have rather than a must-have.

Does Paymos charge extra for XAUT compared to USDT or USDC?

No. The same 1.0% all-in standard rate applies, with acceptance and sweep gas absorbed inside that fee. One operational difference: XAUT is accept-only — withdrawals settle in USDT or USDC, where Paymos takes 0 commission and subsidises the network fee. The exchange step to realize gold into fiat is the merchant's to run, the same as it would be with any gold position.