After the DeFi Summer of 2020, various DeFi protocols focusing on niche markets emerged, and decentralized finance became the most successful application of blockchain technology. Fast forward four years to today, DeFi remains the most mature application on blockchain, but the focus has quietly begun to shift. Swap, DEX, and lending/borrowing DApps have matured and become essential infrastructure for every public chain. Decentralized financial derivatives protocols have become an important direction for innovation in this bull market. Through financial derivatives, investors can participate in various financial activities with lower costs, higher transparency, and stronger security.
In the field of financial derivatives, in addition to decentralized contract leverage products, derivatives related to market interest rates are also a noteworthy direction. Interest rate fluctuations have a profound impact on financial markets, and both investors and institutions need tools to hedge and manage this risk. The introduction of interest rate derivatives will enrich the DeFi ecosystem, making it more diverse and robust, attracting more investors and institutions to participate, and promoting the development of the entire industry. In traditional finance, interest rate derivatives have proven their importance and value. They are widely used in various risk management and speculation strategies, with a large market size and ample liquidity. Compared to various contract leverage protocols, there are very few decentralized interest rate derivative projects, and this market gap provides significant room for innovation.
Interest Rate Derivatives and IPOR
IPOR is an interest rate swap protocol. Simply put, different investors have different needs for deposit and loan interest rates; some expect to receive a fixed rate for a period, while others hope to adjust the rate according to market conditions at any time, thus creating a liquidity market for swaps to meet their needs.
In fact, we can view this model as a DeFi protocol with interest rates as the underlying asset. Here, you can add funds to the interest rate pool or execute buy or sell orders for corresponding fixed or floating rates based on predictions of future interest rate fluctuations to earn returns.
Interest rate swaps are widely used in traditional finance, but they are still in the early stages of development in the DeFi market, with IPOR being a leader in this field.
The core products of IPOR include three aspects: the IPOR Index, AMM automated market making, and asset management contracts. The IPOR Index is an interest rate index that gathers data from various DeFi protocols. Functionally, it is similar to the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR), and we can view it as a market interest rate reference standard. IPOR provides interest rate derivatives and market-making services based on the rates offered by the index, as well as interest rate swap tools to manage market interest rate volatility risk.
IPOR Operating Logic and Tutorial
For most retail investors, products based on interest rates are relatively rare financial tools that ordinary people seldom encounter, yet they are crucial in market trading and arbitrage processes. Therefore, we will explain through practical operations using IPOR, making it easier for everyone to understand the interest rate market and swap transactions.
- Join the Interest Rate Liquidity Pool
By joining the interest rate liquidity pool, you can earn corresponding interest rate volatility returns and also receive IPOR token rewards.
First, open the official IPOR page:
https://app.ipor.io/deposit/ethereum and log in using a wallet like MetaMask. Currently, IPOR supports the Ethereum mainnet and the Arbitrum network; we will use the Ethereum mainnet as an example.
Select the corresponding interest rate liquidity pool, taking stETH as an example.
In the Zap in section, select the corresponding token name, such as ETH or USDC, and then choose the APR rate. The page will calculate the amount of ipstETH and pwIPOR needed for staking. If we do not want to use pwIPOR for boosting, we can directly adjust the APR to 0, at which point we will receive the base APR.
ipstETH is the stETH staked in the pool, which can be deposited directly using USDC or ETH through the protocol. The system will automatically convert it to stETH and stake it, saving users a lot of operations. For ipTokens, the exchange rate with the native token is not 1:1; this is because the price of ipTokens also includes the interest generated from the yield over time, making its value slightly higher than that of the native token.
pwIPOR is the amount of IPOR tokens that need to be staked and is non-transferable. This means that to achieve a fixed rate, you must stake IPOR, which also increases the application scenarios for IPOR tokens. The higher the adjusted rate, the more IPOR needs to be staked. If you later want to exchange pwIPOR for IPOR, there is a 14-day cooling-off period.
- Interest Rate Swap Pool Mining
We can also perform fixed and floating rate swap operations. In the upper left corner of the page, click earn——liquidity mining.
On the page, we can customize the amounts of ipstETH and IPOR and deposit them into the pool. This is somewhat similar to customizing the deposit of two different amounts of tokens to form a liquidity pool in Uniswap, with the difference being that the underlying asset here is the interest generated from the staked tokens.
To facilitate user calculations, the official page also provides a calculator on the right side for precise calculations.
- Interest Rate Trading
We click on the upper left corner of the page trade——interest rates swap, select the trading target, such as stETH, and click “open stETH Swap.”
Here we can use the simple mode.
Select the corresponding collateral, which includes stETH, wETH, wstETH, and ETH, and choose whether the interest rate will rise or fall, as well as the leverage multiplier. Since interest rate fluctuations are very small in reality, using leverage can increase its volatility and enhance returns. Currently, IPOR can provide up to 500 times leverage.
Choose the direction of the trade; for example, if we believe that interest rates will rise in the future, we select rates will go on. Essentially, this means selling a fixed rate in exchange for a floating rate, which will yield positive income when interest rates rise.
Conversely, rates will go down means selling a floating rate in exchange for a fixed rate, indicating a bearish outlook on interest rates. If interest rates decline in the future, you can ensure that your fixed rate remains unchanged, earning additional income compared to the previous floating rate.
Here, the fixed rate can be considered a basic fixed rate; the short and long fixed rates are different and have a price difference. For example, in the image below, when we choose to short the interest rate, the fixed rate is 3.22%, meaning we can only profit if the interest rate falls below 3.22%. Conversely, when we choose to go long on the interest rate, the fixed rate is 3.42%, meaning we can only profit if the interest rate rises above 3.42%.
Then we need to pay an account opening fee (around $20) and a liquidation deposit (worth around $40). The account opening fee is non-refundable later, while the liquidation deposit can be refunded when we close the position.
How to Use IPOR for DeFi Arbitrage and Yield
- Hedge Against Interest Rate Cuts
From the above functions, we can see that the interest rate trading feature of IPOR is a tool. For large holders, its main application scenario is as a hedging measure to protect against their own risks or to engage in corresponding arbitrage activities.
For example, if you anticipate that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates in the second half of this year, which will also affect the interest rates on stablecoin deposits and loans in the DeFi market, you can lock in a relatively long-term fixed rate through IPOR, allowing you to earn more interest than the market after the rate cut.
If you believe the Federal Reserve will keep rates unchanged, you can choose to provide liquidity to IPOR for market making, thus earning corresponding market-making returns.
- Fixed Rate Borrowing and Lending
If you want to borrow at a fixed rate, you can hedge using Morpho, which optimizes borrowing rates on Compound and AAVE.
First, deposit collateral into Morpho, then borrow stablecoins like USDT or USDC. At this point, you will have a floating rate loan. Then, in IPOR, perform Pay fixed, meaning you are buying in the direction of rising interest rates.
When actual interest rates rise, the borrowing interest on Morpho increases, raising borrowing costs, but you will earn corresponding income in IPOR. The reverse is also true, thus ensuring that the interest rate remains approximately fixed.
Using the same method, we can also obtain a fixed deposit rate. Deposit tokens into Compound or AAVE, then buy into IPOR for a declining interest rate. When actual interest rates fall, we can earn additional income in IPOR, but the returns in Compound or AAVE will decrease, thus achieving a fixed rate effect.
- Increase ETH Returns and Reduce Loss Risks
Additionally, we can use IPOR to achieve fixed returns amid ETH price fluctuations. For instance, when we are bullish on ETH, we can use IPOR to join the ETH liquidity pool. At this point, the zap function can automatically purchase ipstETH and pwIPOR using USDC, yielding an annualized return of 42.35%. Simultaneously, we can purchase put options for ETH at the current price on Premia or Deribit as a hedge.
This ensures that if ETH drops, even if the value of ipstETH in IPOR decreases, the put options will earn returns, and we will also receive IPOR token rewards, offsetting corresponding losses. If the price of ETH rises, the options will only incur limited losses, while the price of ipstETH will also rise, leading to unlimited potential gains. Compared to stablecoin deposit returns, this strategy allows for limited losses and unlimited upside potential, thereby increasing expected returns.
Furthermore, IPOR can combine more strategies to achieve arbitrage and low-risk high-return strategies, which also requires more investors to explore and discover wealth opportunities. At the same time, IPOR is developing an automated asset management system through its team to help investors manage their on-chain investment assets and achieve higher yields.
IPOR Fusion—Automated Asset Management System for DeFi Ecosystem
As seen above, the emergence of IPOR brings new strategies and arbitrage opportunities to the DeFi market. IPOR has launched IPOR Fusion, which aims to integrate different routing and aggregation protocols into a single smart contract, driven by algorithms and artificial intelligence (AI), to help users find opportunities for various arbitrage and investment, creating greater value.
The core of IPOR Fusion consists of two aspects: an elegant smart layer and an automated execution core. This allows for the integration and management of liquidity providers, borrowers, and leveraged participants, optimizing returns, managing risks, and establishing higher-yield investment strategies.
Currently, IPOR Fusion has begun integrating into the DeFi market, including AAVE, Compound, Morpho, Gearbox, etc., with more markets to be integrated in the future, such as Pendle, Notional V3, Term Structure, etc. For example, leveraging the borrowing of ETH and the returns from stETH, fixed income rates can be achieved through IPOR ETH borrowing rate swaps and staking rate swaps, potentially yielding 40% returns.
Using IPOR SRS to Hedge ETH Staking Returns
SRS stands for Stake Rate Swaps, which refers to staking rate swaps. Taking stETH as an example, IPOR Labs engineers predict the on-chain performance and activity of Lido stakers to derive the real-time staking rate and yield of stETH. This method is more accurate than Lido's official data published every 24 hours. Moreover, IPOR has launched the IPOR stETH Index, which is related to the rewards of the Ethereum execution layer (EL) and consensus layer (CL). For instance, CL rewards are inversely proportional to the fixed percentage of ETH, while EL rewards increase with network activity.
Through the IPOR stETH Index, these volatilities can be traded in the market. For example, if Ethereum ETFs are approved, increased on-chain activity also indicates that stETH yields will rise, allowing for arbitrage in IPOR.
IPOR Token Information
The total supply of IPOR tokens is 100 million, distributed as follows:
Token release schedule:
The project team, IPOR Labs, is located in Zug, Switzerland, known as the "Crypto Valley." The team consists of experienced quantitative financial analysts, three PhDs, and software developers from banking and insurance industries, with 22 years of experience in fixed income.
CEO and co-founder Darren Camas has experience working in investment banking and derivatives trading, with a deep understanding of financial products. He entered the cryptocurrency industry in 2011 and has held important positions in projects like Cardano and 1inch, as well as being part of the BD team for one of the earliest exchanges (second only to MT GOX) and working at Binance. The team’s chief scientist, Mauricio Hernandes, holds a PhD in computer science and leads the cryptocurrency department of Japan's securities giant SBI.
IPOR completed a $5.55 million funding round in 2022, with major institutions including Arrington Capital, gumi Cryptos Capital, Space Whale Capital, New Form Capital, CMT Digital, C² Ventures, GSR, Bloccelerate, Mentha Partners, AG Build, Synaps, g1 vc, SOSV, Stateless VC, Next Chymia, Crypto Discover, NxGen, Panony, and others.
IPOR is currently listed on Gateio and Bitget exchanges, with a market capitalization of around $13.67 million and a circulating supply ratio of less than 20%. This is mainly because the on-chain interest rate derivatives protocol is still in its early development stages.
However, compared to traditional finance, interest rate derivatives have extensive applications in traditional finance, and clients are generally institutional users. Therefore, it is foreseeable that the on-chain interest rate derivatives sector is still a blue ocean, and IPOR has significant growth potential.
Conclusion
With the approval of BTC and ETH spot ETFs by regulatory agencies, more traditional investment institutions are paying attention to cryptocurrencies and actively positioning themselves. We all know that the current blockchain ecosystem is still in its early development stage, and the bull market expectations for 2024 and 2025 are also the focus of capital attention. Interest rate derivatives have already matured in traditional centralized finance, and blockchain brings new possibilities for decentralized finance, indicating a broad prospect in decentralized finance. However, currently, aside from Pendle, there are no other mature applications related to on-chain interest rate derivatives, representing a significant market gap.
IPOR's products are pioneers in the current interest rate derivatives market, and on-chain data shows signs of rising. The platform token IPOR has risen from $0.36 at the beginning of the year to $0.81. Coupled with the trading and arbitrage strategies brought by IPOR in conjunction with other DeFi derivatives protocols, it can help institutions and large funds achieve low-risk stable returns. In the future, IPOR is likely to become a leader in the interest rate derivatives market, driving the development of the entire Web3 industry.
★
For more information
Add WeChat: Chloe95117
Follow the public account: B Chain Story