最新报道：This is an excerpt from the 0xResearch newsletter. To read the full version, please subscribe. Banks take deposits and invest a portion of them in riskier, less liquid assets - that's how they make money. This "borrow short, lend long" business model is also known as fractional reserve banking. As long as not every depositor wants to withdraw their money at the same time, everyone is happy! When crisis mode hits and users rush to the exits, the banks' risk models are put to the test. The core of the problem lies in the opacity of bank liabilities and available assets. In theory, if this information was visible, you could avoid this problem because you can formulate your own risk model. Enter infiniFi, a new DeFi protocol built on Ethereum that aims to replicate the entire stack of fractional reserve banking on-chain. How it works: Users deposit stablecoins to receive iUSD receipt stablecoins. For a lower risk yield, stake iUSD to receive siUSD. This is liquid. For a higher risk yield, lock iUSD to receive liUSD. This is illiquid. Now here comes the components of "fractional reserve banking". InfiniFi deploys the liUSD liquidity pool into lower risk return money markets like Aave or Fluid, while having the option to deploy the siUSD illiquid pool into higher risk return strategies. (Governance will ultimately determine these decisions.) The exact ratio depends on the preferences expressed by depositors and the yield option they choose (siUSD vs. liUSD). The positive result? InfiniFi can allocate higher yields to both groups of depositors than if they pursued the strategies individually. Source: infiniFi. According to infiniFi’s website, whether you choose to liquid (siUSD) or lock (liUSD) yield, you get a relatively higher yield than the underlying protocol. Source: infiniFi. It’s a clever business model. But what infiniFi itself does — borrow short and lend long — isn’t that different from what banks typically do. The innovation is that the entire stack is on the blockchain. That’s why you as a user can sleep soundly — knowing that your bank isn’t going to do uncontrolled leverage on the most illiquid assets like Sam Bankman-Fried did. InfiniFi’s reserve composition is fully transparent on-chain, so you don’t have to rely on quarterly call reports. You can easily look up USDC deposits and iUSD tokens minted against it to determine its exact asset-liability mismatch, if any. You can also see a breakdown of the protocol’s yield strategy, or whether the protocol is honoring its liquidity buffers — down to what amount and type of assets they consist of. Source: Dune. In the event of a hack or “bank run,” explicitly coded loss waterfalls determine who gets paid in order. The highest-yielding and locked-up liUSD token holders bear the brunt of the losses first. SiUSD stakers (lower-yielding, no lock-ups) are only affected once locked-up users are liquidated. Regular iUSD holders are last in line. No one wants to see this happen, but users can at least take comfort in the fact that they don’t have to wait two years like FTX depositors did. InfiniFi has already attracted $33 million in TVL, and has an ongoing six-month points program that kicks off in early June. Get news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: The Breakdown: Decoding crypto and markets. Daily. Empire: Crypto news and analysis to jumpstart your day. Forward Guidance: The intersection of crypto, macroeconomics, and policy. 0xResearch: Get Alpha straight to your inbox. Lightspeed: All about Solana. The Drop: Apps, games, memes, and more. Supply Shock: Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.