how do the major stable coins maintain their price? 

more specific the answer the better

@farcaster dev / dad / books, cooks, ski, code ~ there are many things of which a wise man might wish to be ignorant

USDC has regular public audits available.

If you don’t believe Circle and Coinbase are able to redeem $1 for each 1 USDC, then someone who does will be willing to buy it from you at the discount essentially risk free. Thus the discount is below the clearing price for it to make sense.

assuming Circle and Tether have private agreements with companies like Coinbase. I can't redeem directly with Circle & Tether but there is some process Coinbase has to?

Circle and Tether don't need to worry about doing an arbs themselves because the market handles this sufficiently?

Literally go to Coinbase and convert to USD. It’s instant and free.

makes sense but where does this play out? how do I redeem? are there specific large LPs where I can see this in action?