# Interest in Tenge Versus Holding Stablecoins: The Honest Comparison

> A local deposit pays a rate in a currency that moves. A dollar stablecoin pays nothing in a currency that does not. Both are positions.

- Source: https://steppeledger.com/interest-in-tenge-versus-stablecoins/
- Published: 2026-10-07
- Author: Timur Abenov
- Publication: Steppe Ledger — Digital money in Kazakhstan, rule by rule
- Topic: stablecoin payments
- Tags: stablecoin payments, tenge, treasury

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Businesses here face a treasury question that most do not frame as one: in which currency to hold working capital.

## The tenge deposit

Pays a rate set in the local market, inside the banking system, with deposit protection up to a limit and no currency risk against local obligations.

For a business whose costs and revenues are both in tenge, this is the position with no exposure, whatever the rate.

## The dollar stablecoin

Pays nothing. Carries issuer risk and venue risk. And removes the exposure of a tenge balance to a tenge move, while adding exposure to the opposite move.

For a business with dollar obligations, this reduces risk. For one without, it creates risk.

## The framing that matters

Not which pays more. Which matches your liabilities.

A company holding dollars against tenge costs has taken a currency position whether or not anyone called it that, and the position can exceed the margin on the underlying business.

## Where the stablecoin genuinely helps

Businesses invoicing abroad in dollars, paying foreign suppliers, or holding a buffer against an obligation denominated in dollars.

In those cases it is a hedge rather than a bet.

## Where it does not

A domestic business holding dollars because the rate feels safer. That is a directional view on the tenge, taken by a company with no expertise in it and no mandate for it.

## The risks the comparison usually omits

The deposit has protection up to a limit and an identifiable bank. The stablecoin has an issuer and a venue, neither covered by any guarantee.

A yield comparison that ignores this is comparing two different kinds of thing.

## The arrangement most businesses land on

Tenge for operating balances matched to tenge costs. Dollars, via stablecoin or a currency account, only against dollar obligations. Neither held in size at a venue.

[A regulated counterparty](https://collectnexchange.com/compliance/cysec-licensed) for the conversion, with balances moved out rather than parked.

## What makes it defensible to a board

A written policy stating which currency is held against which obligation, and records showing it was followed. [A platform that issues a statement you can file](https://collectnexchange.com/business-solutions/corporate-crypto-wallet) supplies the second half, and [Collect & Exchange, which operates under a licence](https://collectnexchange.com/), is a counterparty the policy can name.

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This article explains how something works. It is not financial advice.
Canonical HTML version: https://steppeledger.com/interest-in-tenge-versus-stablecoins/