Corporate credit platform Maple Finance, in collaboration with Icebreaker Finance, has launched a pool of $300 million to help BTC miners as the crypto downturn weighs on the mining industry.
The pool will focus on mid-sized public and private mining firms across North America, Australia, and Canada.
According to Maple Finance, the underlying loans, which can be availed by securing physical or digital assets, will have a 12-18 month tenure with interest rates ranging from 15-20%.
It’s the first time Maple is providing collateralized loans with real-world assets and marks a significant change outside its existing market-maker borrower set.
For investors, the venture would be a first-time public opportunity to support miners and related infrastructure providers with lucrative returns up to 13%.
“Recent market headwinds have caused lenders to pull back, while traditional financing vehicles have been slower to engage this sector. Miners play an essential role in growing the crypto ecosystem and local economies, and we are proud to extend a new financing vehicle to direct capital where it is needed the most,” said CEO and Co-Founder of Maple Finance, Sidney Powell.
Australian-based Icebreaker Finance, which has years of experience in structural finance and capital markets, will help manage and facilitate loans on the Maple platform.
“The market is now maturing to appreciate that non-recourse SPV ASIC backed financing can be inappropriate given the volatility in value of ASICs. Maple’s out-of-the-box, on-chain lending toolkit enables us to align incentives of lenders and borrowers to execute loans on-chain,” said CEO and Founder of Icebreaker Finance, Glyn Jones.
As of today, Maple is a leader in DeFi loans with a 50% market share. Since its May 2021 launch, the protocol has issued close to $1.8 billion in loans.
