Tetra's CADD Canadian Dollar Stablecoin Goes Live on Solana

CADD, the Canadian dollar stablecoin issued by Tetra Digital Group, went live on Solana on September 23. Tetra announced the launch at 13:30 UTC, describing CADD as "the first Canadian-dollar stablecoin issued by a regulated financial institution" and pitching it for payments, transfers, treasury and settlement. The official Solana account confirmed it about 40 minutes later.

Solana is CADD's fourth network. The token launched on May 4 on Ethereum, Base and Tempo, and Solana support was already on the roadmap at the time, CoinDesk reported. Its backers are a roster of Canadian finance and commerce names: Shopify, Wealthsimple, National Bank of Canada, ATB Financial, Purpose Unlimited and Shakepay, with Urbana Corporation as majority holder.

Official CADD Mint Address on Solana

About two hours after the launch post, Tetra warned that fake CADD tokens were appearing on-chain and published the official Solana mint:

Az9eyxEaiZD9AX4j5nP19Cm79eyfNriTuddMSQmLNEBm

The address can be checked on the Solana Explorer. Anyone can create a token called CADD on a permissionless network, so anyone receiving "CADD" should match the mint, not the name.

The genuine mint is starting small. As of 16:52 UTC on September 23, it showed 79,000 CADD in supply across 11 holder wallets, according to Solana Compass token data. The same data shows the mint has both a mint authority and a freeze authority set. That is the standard setup for a regulated stablecoin: the issuer can create tokens against new deposits and freeze accounts when compliance requires it. Circle's EURC mint on Solana is configured the same way.

How CADD Works: Regulated Issuer, 1:1 Canadian Dollar Reserves

CADD is issued by Tetra Trust Company, a licensed trust company, under approval from Alberta Treasury Board and Finance. Each token is backed 1:1 by Canadian dollars held at tier-one Canadian banks, with monthly external audits published as attestations and unannounced random audits on top, BNN Bloomberg reported. CoinDesk adds that reserves are held in trust under Canadian law and dedicated to redemption.

The provincial route matters because Canada's federal Stablecoin Act does not take effect until 2027, per BNN Bloomberg. Until then, CADD operates under Alberta's prudential rules for regulated financial institutions. CEO Didier Lavallée told BNN Bloomberg that this is "the best alignment that Canadians can get today."

The product pitch is about what Canadian businesses pay to route activity through U.S. dollars.

Tetra told CoinDesk that Canada clears roughly $424 billion per business day on legacy payment systems, and that flow is what CADD is pitched at. The token also has a test run behind it. In December, Wealthsimple and National Bank of Canada moved CADD between them on a testnet, which CoinDesk described as "the first time a Canadian stablecoin moved between two financial institutions."

Other Canadian Dollar Stablecoins: QCAD and Loon

CADD is not the only Canadian dollar token. Stablecorp's QCAD, backed by Coinbase Ventures, received final approval in December 2024, and CADC, launched in 2021 and later acquired by Loon, has processed more than $200 million in volume, according to CoinDesk. What sets CADD apart is its issuer and its shareholders. A licensed trust company holds the reserves, and National Bank of Canada, ATB Financial, Shopify and Wealthsimple all hold stakes in the company behind it. Institutional custody is also in place: Anchorage Digital has provided custody for institutional clients since late May, Crypto Briefing reported.

Those shareholders double as possible distribution channels. Shopify merchants, Wealthsimple users and National Bank clients are exactly the businesses and savers a 24/7 Canadian dollar is built for.

Non-USD Stablecoins on Solana: CAD Follows the Rand and the Euro

Lavallée has argued that because nearly all on-chain settlement runs through dollar tokens such as USDC, even domestic Canadian transactions end up tied to the U.S. dollar, Crypto Briefing reported. Local-currency stablecoins remove that step, and Solana is collecting more of them. Three days before CADD's arrival, we covered Supercoin's launch of ZARsc, South Africa's first FSCA-licensed rand stablecoin, on Solana.

The euro is further along. EURC has 105.0 million tokens in supply on Solana across 59,510 holders, per Solana Compass data as of September 23. That puts CADD's first day in scale.

The Canadian launch also fits a pattern among regulated institutions picking Solana for stablecoin payments. Earlier this month, Column N.A. named Solana as the default chain for its native stablecoin rails. Tetra's launch post sold CADD on Solana as fast, programmable and available around the clock, which are the properties a settlement asset needs when the other side of the trade is a merchant payout or a treasury transfer.

The measure of success now is usage. Because the mint is public, anyone can track CADD's supply and holder count on Solana over the coming weeks and see whether Shopify merchants and Canadian fintechs actually move money this way.