What Is the Counterparty Risk in Centralized Stablecoins Compared to Decentralized Ones?
Centralized stablecoins carry high counterparty risk, as users must trust the issuing entity holds the promised reserves and will honor redemptions. This is a risk of fraud or mismanagement.
Decentralized stablecoins shift this risk to the smart contract and the underlying collateral's volatility and protocol design. While they remove human counterparty risk, they introduce smart contract risk and systemic market risk.