FAQ

What is Syrup?

Syrup makes consistent high yield available to everyone in DeFi. The yield is generated by Maple’s digital asset lending platform that provides fixed-rate, overcollateralised loans to institutional borrowers. These short duration loans enable Syrup to provide consistent high yield as well as short term liquidity for Syrup users. The strategy has a track record of consistent yield outperformance compared to leading DeFi lending protocols.

Syrup has scaled rapidly since launch and is a trusted source of real, sustainable yield in DeFi.

What is the expected APY?

Syrup has a target net APY of 15% and has delivered consistent yield outperformance compared to leading DeFi lending protocols. Yield generation is enhanced through liquid and native staking, with full transparency provided to lenders.

How are the loans protected?

Active collateral management and overcollateralisation ensure that lender principal is protected. The loans and collateral are transparently shown in the webapp, allowing lenders to verify the performance in real time. More details on Maple's underwriting and collateral management can be found here.

What is the relationship between Maple and Syrup?

Syrup leverages the same smart contract infrastructure and borrower network as Maple, but offers permissionless access through DeFi. Syrup yield is derived from a blend of Maple High Yield Secured and Blue Chip Secured lending pools.

How are Maple and Syrup vaults segregated?

Both Maple and Syrup loans are verifiable onchain with transparent margin call and liquidation levels for each individual loan. Further, lender funds are stored in non-custodial smart contracts for both Maple and Syrup pools. However, Maple and Syrup vaults differ in legal structure. Maple constructs a segregated bankruptcy-remote entity for each individual pool, while Syrup utilizes a segregated SPV for its pool. The use of a bankruptcy-remote entity reflects the institutional focus of Maple.

Who are the borrowers on Maple/Syrup?

Maple and Syrup facilitate lending to permissioned borrowers, which complete KYC/AML checks and a rigorous underwriting process. The Maple Direct team assesses the strength of the borrower’s balance sheet and if they have the operational sophistication to meet margin calls quickly in a falling market environment.

What collateral is accepted and how are new collateral evaluated?

Rigorous borrower underwriting and detailed collateral analysis ensure robust risk management and capital preservation. Collateral is evaluated for liquidity, historical volatility, and technical security.

Assets without acceptable liquidity are not eligible, and concentration limits are applied across the loan book so that Maple will never be too large a portion of a given market (minimizing slippage). More volatile assets require higher collateral-to-loan ratios. Maple’s industry leading smart contracts team completes a detailed analysis of the underlying protocol (e.g. Lido, Pendle), including a review of previous audits and code architecture.

Once internal approvals on the underwrite and collateral type have been met, the team sets tailored terms for the borrower.

Current accepted collateral on Syrup includes:

• BTC

• SOL

• ETH

• sDAI

• PT_sUSDE

• OrcaLP_PYUSDC

How is collateral stored?

Collateral is held with institutional grade custody solutions (e.g. Anchorage, BitGo, Zodia), and Maple provides on-chain addresses for lenders to verify the collateral details for each outstanding loan.

Maple can stake collateral and pass on a portion of the yield to lenders to enhance yield. There are two main ways Maple stakes digital assets to earn rewards: liquid staking and native staking. More on that here.

At what rate are liquidation levels set and how are they managed?

The Maple Direct team actively manages the health of the loan book through margin calls and liquidation levels, always set conservatively above 100% collateralization to protect lender funds.

The Maple Operations team has a proprietary alert system in place with three separate sources for price feeds, and a 24/7/365 live monitoring process to enable swift margin calls and collateral liquidation.

If collateral value falls to the Margin Call Level, the borrower is automatically notified and has 24 hours to top up and restore collateralization to the Initial Collateral Level. If they fail to do so in time, Maple liquidates their collateral as part of the legal agreement with the borrower.

Why do Maple’s offerings outperform?

Maple and Syrup have a track record of yield outperformance compared to leading DeFi lending protocols through a combination of active management and high utilization. Maple and Syrup have consistently high utilization across their secured lending products, driven by actively sourced deals.

Further, when there is lower borrower demand, and market rates fall, Maple issues shorter term loans, setting up flexibility to re-issue loans at higher rates when market conditions change. When rates are elevated, the team issues loans with longer time frames to lock in the higher yield environment.‍