Lending Platforms Not Yet in The Clear Even as US Regulators Shift Focus to Exchanges

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) chair Gary Gensler last month laid on Nexo charges adding up to “bypassing essential disclosure requirements” in relation to its retail crypto lending program, the Earn Interest Product (EIP) offered to US clients. The markets regulator exacted a fine of $22.5 million on the lender and a cease-and-desist order asking it to stop offering the product in the US. The UK-based institutional investment firm additionally paid an equal sum as part of a multi-state settlement concerning the same program following a comprehensive probe by a North American Securities Administrators Association working group.

The group constituted state regulators from Indiana, Kentucky, New York, Oklahoma, Maryland, South Carolina, Wisconsin, Washington, and Vermont, who concluded the investigations after several months, ruling that Earn Interest Product accounts are securities. Thus, firms looking to offer them to investors must register with the relevant authorities and declare risk disclosures.

Nexo’s yield-bearing Earn product will no longer be accessible in the US starting April

In a Feb 10 update to its US-based clients, the crypto lending platform said it was terminating its yield-bearing Earn Interest Product (EIP) effective Apr 1. The program’s discontinuation would see it comply with the no-admit-no-deny settlement it reached with US regulators last month. Nexo said Earn users will continue to receive interest payments until the effective termination date, and fixed-term product subscribers will have their product unlocked on the said date.

The firm assured its services remain operational in jurisdictions outside of the US. Notably, the shutdown will not affect other services and products offered in the US. Nexo’s communication came a day after Salt Lending separately notified investors that it had raised funds and was set to resume operations.

Salt Lending hopes to bounce back in the coming months

The pioneer crypto lender announced it had successfully converted approximately $64.4 million of its debt into Series A preferred stock. In the recapitalization effort, the crypto finance firm, which froze withdrawals and lost its California lending license last year, issued stocks to accredited investors in exchange for canceling its outstanding debts, bolstering its balance sheet and capital reserves.

The debt conversion is a turning point for the company as it can now embark on a growth path, having faced challenges due to the FTX meltdown and the crypto winter that swept the market last year.   The freeze on withdrawals and deposits to the platform may have caused concern among investors. The financial services company worked its socks off to assure every customer that all was well, according to founder and interim CEO Shawn Owen. He noted that the November freeze on funds transactions was a traumatic experience for their clientele, as most had suffered financial losses from the issues with Celsius and BlockFi.

The executive explained that it took a personal effort to calm down users’ anxiety and fear, providing reassurance and stability to their customers, all while maintaining open and transparent lines of communication. He believes that the company survived an existential threat and is now set up for even greater success in the future. Salt’s plan to restore entire operations towards the end of this quarter awaits regulatory approval.

More funding to keep the cogs moving

SALT’s customers are primarily individuals and businesses holding HODLing Bitcoin for the long term, looking to monetize their crypto for various purposes while maintaining confidence in their ability to pay off loans and recover their collateral. To provide this service, the company must demonstrate that it has a robust capital buffer and can sell collateral instantaneously. Hence, Salt plans to seek further funding for up to $100 million in a Series B financing round later this year.

Maple Finance to bring receivables financing on-chain, with a $100 million liquidity pool

Following the launch of a credit pool for stressed Bitcoin miners last September, Maple Finance, one the largest blockchain-based creditors of corporate clients, announced on Jan 25 it partnered with DeFi incubator specialist AQRU to bring receivables financing on-chain. The decentralized credit market for institutional borrowers and lenders has issued nearly $2 billion in loans. The Real-World Receivables pool is meant to provide a yield-generating mechanism for accredited investors, such as institutional asset managers and DAOs, by taking tax rebates and funding program receivables as collateral.

Funding for the pool

The pool is uncorrelated with the crypto market and offers an annualized yield of 10%, with a minimum investment threshold of $500,000 in USDC and a 45-day lock-up period. AQRU will provide seed funding of $3 million for the USDC stablecoin liquidity pool, with Intero Capital Solutions serving as the sole borrower. The London-based firm also plans to extend a $100 million loan facility by accumulating outside deposits from accredited participants seeking returns uncorrelated to the crypto market’s high volatility. The pool would be open to accredited investors who have satisfied anti-money laundering (AML) and know-your-customer (KYC) requirements. The new receivables financing pool would also consider lowering the barrier entry once the pool grows beyond a certain size, according to the official announcement.

Firms and investors to benefit

Firms that pass as satisfactory will pledge their receivables as collateral for the loans so they can receive cash advances at a discounted rate through the optimization of tax rebates and funding program incentives such as the Employee Retention Credit (ERC) program administered by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Investors of the liquidity pool will receive their rewards once the IRS transfers the credit. The AQRU-managed pool represents a shift in Maple’s lending strategy, away from uncollateralized crypto lending synonymous with crypto trading firms.

Maple’s CEO Sidney Powell said this pool is the first of a series that will be introduced with yield-generating strategies adopted from traditional finance, including products to invest in US Treasury bonds and insurance refinancing. Last week, the financial infrastructure provider shared its product roadmap for the first half of this year.

“Institutional DeFi has the potential to revolutionize the world of finance. […] Our efforts this year will see us make further advances in removing back and middle office services through programmable and immutable smart-contracts,” the firm said in the Feb 8 update.

The protocol’s team will focus on the ‘Maple 2.0’ project, released in December, in particular, scalability, by on-boarding more delegates.

Q4 earnings report

In its Q4 Treasury report released a week before the AQRU partnership announcement, Maple Finance revealed the protocol bore a $7.06 million net loss across that fiscal period. The institutional capital marketplace also said its decision to implement cost-saving measures such as reducing its workforce, discontinuing the Maple Solana project, and realigning departmental budgets and plans is already bearing fruit, as the quarterly expenses have now fallen to about $390,000 per month. This helped reduce the costs (excluding one-off and non-recurring charges) by roughly half the amount spent in Q4 of 2021, though team expenses continue to comprise the majority overall.

Liquidity and loan volumes in Q4

The active liquidity on Maple dropped from $326 million to $58 million going into the fourth quarter, primarily due to a decrease in borrowing demand caused by lower exchange volumes and lenders who have opted to leave the money in their pockets. Maple Finance originated $87 million in loan volume across 23 new loans in Q4, compared to the $262 million in loans issued in Q3.

Further, it closed the quarter with a total of $58 million in active liquidity, down nearly six times from the previous quarter. The figures represent the grip of the bear market, which hasn’t loosened any much amid modest price recoveries. Crypto companies still have an uphill task wallowing the disarray resulting from macroeconomic pressure.

Cash Cloud joins a list of bankrupt crypto companies

Crypto ATM operator Cash Cloud (which runs under the name Coin Cloud) filed for bankruptcy last week, citing continued losses in the previous two years. The firm, which operates up to 5,000 crypto ATMs in the US and Brazil, told the US Bankruptcy Court District of Nevada, Las Vegas, that it seeks a buyer or capital injection to keep the business afloat.

The ATM operator had assets in the range of $50 million to $100 million and liabilities quantified between $100 million and $500 million, according to the Feb 7 filing. Cash Cloud has obligations to between 5,000 and 10,000 creditors, with the biggest being Genesis Global Capital, a subsidiary firm under the umbrella of Digital Currency Group’s defunct lending division. Genesis has an unsecured claim spanning more than $108 million, about 14 times more than the second-largest claimant.