Proposal: Maple and Anchorage Digital as Direct Lending Partners

General
1

Summary

This proposal puts forward Maple and Anchorage as potential direct lending partners for the backing assets of USDe. If approved, stablecoins in the backing of USDe can be used to supply to Maple and Anchorage under specific provisions in order to receive a return on the assets lent out. Both entities will unlock a new market for Ethena: offchain, overcollateralized lending, while maintaining acceptable risk parameters and transparency standards.

The Risk Committee have been briefed of this proposal in advance and have reviewed the specific MLA’s for both Maple and Anchorage. While the specific terms of the agreements can’t be shared publicly for confidentiality reasons, the Risk Committee have seen the specific details and provided valuable feedback privately on several provisions. The Risk Committee will publish the outcome of their review in the replies to this post.

Background

Maple Institutional

Maple Institutional Secured Lending offers overcollateralized loans to institutional borrowers, backed by BTC, ETH and other tokens that pass an in depth collateral review process. Loans are overcollateralized to leading institutions, reviewed by Maple’s internal credit team, and monitored 24/7 with real-time onchain transparency.

**Anchorage Digital
**

Anchorage Digital is a global crypto platform that enables institutions to participate in digital assets through custody, staking, trading, governance, settlement, and the industry’s leading security infrastructure. Anchorage Digital Bank National Association holds a federal OCC charter (granted 2021), making it the first federally chartered digital asset bank in the United States.

Next Steps

If approved, Ethena will begin testing flows to Maple and Anchorage before scaling these positions. Offchain lending will be included in Ethena’s proof of reserves going forward and positions will be detailed in the transparency page of the Ethena app. Any additional partners for offchain lending outside of Maple and Anchorage will need new proposals to the Ethena Risk Committee.

2

Legal Review of Ethena MLAs

Summary

LlamaRisk has conducted a legal review of the Master Loan Agreements governing Ethena’s reserve-backing asset deployment to two institutional counterparties: Anchorage Digital (via A1, Ltd.) and Maple Finance (via Protocol Pool Operations Alpha LLC).

Scope of Review

For each agreement, LlamaRisk assessed counterparty structure and regulatory standing, asset protection mechanisms (collateral, security interests, enforceability), operational provisions (loan origination, recall mechanics, reporting), default and remedies architecture, and protocol-specific considerations relevant to digital asset lending. The specific contractual terms, commercial thresholds, and pricing provisions are confidential and are not disclosed in this public summary.

Findings

The Anchorage MLA establishes a bilateral lending framework with A1, Ltd., a Cayman Islands entity within the Anchorage Digital group. The Maple MLA establishes a pool-based lending framework through PPO Alpha, a Delaware LLC within the Maple Finance ecosystem. Given the different deployment models, each agreement was assessed on its own structural merits.

LlamaRisk reviewed the confidential provisions of both agreements in detail. As a result of thorough analysis — at some instances with insightful inputs from Ethena Labs on the relevant legal design choices — we can confirm that no material contractual deficiencies are present under either agreement.

Conclusion

LlamaRisk supports the Risk Committee’s approval of both the Anchorage and Maple Master Loan Agreements for the deployment of Ethena’s reserve-backing assets.

3

As a member of Ethena’s Risk Committee, Kairos Research has reviewed the MLAs on the proposed deployment of USDe backing assets to both Maple Finance and Anchorage Digital. We support the proposal and agree with LlamaRisk’s independent analysis on the terms of the agreements.

Beyond the legal review, Kairos believes that the expansion to Maple & Anchorage is a natural step in the maturation of USDe. As of March 11, 2026, Ethena has largely deployed USDe’s backing assets / liquid stables to Aave and Morpho. USDe has a circulating supply of 5.92bn in, $5.27bn of that sits in cash & stables. Aave and Morpho deposits ($1.75bn) are a subcategory of Liquid Cash and currently make up 33.2% of the liquid backing and 29.5% of the outstanding supply.

The addition of these two new, battle-tested venues serve three primary objectives in Ethena’s over-collateralized lending strategy.

  1. Risk Diversification: Allows the protocol to split the liquid backing across additional trusted venues

  2. Return Optimization

  3. Liquidity Enhancement

We will continue to monitor the growth and risk across all approved venues.