Ethena Looks for Yield in Equity Perps as USDe Supply Falls
Ethena wants to support the falling USDe supply with yield from equity perps, where funding on Binance and Hyperliquid is higher than on Bitcoin derivatives.
Key Takeaways
- Ethena wants to use equity perpetual futures as a new source of yield for USDe, now that crypto derivatives have become less attractive.
- The USDe supply fell from nearly $15 billion to below $5 billion, pushing Ethena to look for new revenue sources to back it.
- Ethena expects to announce its first exchange partners within weeks and sees real-world asset perpetuals as more important for USDe over time.
Ethena is shifting its focus to equity perpetual futures as a new source of yield for USDe. The crypto protocol behind the $4 billion (€3.4 billion) synthetic dollar wants to benefit from strong demand for leverage in stocks now that returns from crypto derivatives have become less attractive.
New Market for Yield
The protocol said Friday that it wants to expand its basis trade into equity perpetual futures. Open interest in that market has climbed to $6.2 billion (€5.3 billion), up from less than $1 billion (€0.9 billion) in March, according to Ethena. Funding rates averaged around 14% on Hyperliquid and 17.5% on Binance over the past few months, compared with low single-digit levels for Bitcoin during the same period.
Ethena has used a similar strategy in crypto since USDe launched. It keeps exposure to an asset while shorting the perpetual contracts, so it collects the funding paid by leveraged long traders. That became less profitable this year as the crypto market cooled and Bitcoin funding fell to 2.2% through August 11, after 11% in 2024 and 4.9% in 2025.
USDe Looks for New Backing
The expansion comes at a time when the USDe supply has dropped below $5 billion (€4.3 billion), after peaking at nearly $15 billion (€12.9 billion). Ethena therefore wants to tap new revenue sources to back the token. Earlier this week, it also announced a major overhaul of ENA tokenomics, removing monthly VC unlocks and opening a vote on using revenue from Ethena companies for token buybacks.
Co-founder Guy Young said in an X post that stocks have a more attractive funding profile than crypto because prices often rise over the long term, which creates steady demand for leveraged long exposure. According to Ethena, funding on equity perps was positive on 94% of days on Hyperliquid and on 97% of days on Binance once those markets reached enough size. Median funding was 13.9%, compared with 3.9% for Bitcoin.
Why This Matters
For European crypto followers, this move shows how quickly the line between crypto and traditional markets is blurring. RWA perpetual futures, where synthetic exposure to stocks is traded, are drawing more and more volume, and major exchanges like Binance are already playing an important role. That could matter for the broader debate around 24/7 trading, tokenization of traditional assets, and oversight of new derivatives markets.
Ethena expects to announce its first exchange partners and rollout for the stock strategy in the coming weeks. Over the longer term, the protocol thinks real-world asset perpetuals could make up a bigger share of USDe backing than crypto derivatives within 12 to 24 months. The company also pointed out that the total value of global stocks was around $166.5 trillion (€143 trillion) in July, compared with about $2.2 trillion (€1.9 trillion) for crypto, although the equity perps market itself is still much smaller than the crypto derivatives market.
The search for extra yield fits into a broader trend around stablecoins. Other players are also building new yield and reserve structures, such as the credit facility with FalconX, which had already expanded USDe backing beyond the classic basis trade.
