Credit · Fixed Income · PENDLE
Pendle tokenizes yield-bearing assets into Principal Tokens (PT) and Yield Tokens (YT), creating an on-chain market for fixed-rate yield and yield speculation/hedging. Pendle V2's specialized AMM and vote-escrowed vePENDLE coordinate liquidity across dozens of maturity-dated yield markets, and Boros extends the model to funding-rate trading.
Tokenized yield: split principal and yield (PT/YT).
PENDLE price
$1.34
-0.4% 24h
Latest data · 15 min delay
Pendle splits any yield bearing token into a Principal Token () and a Yield Token () with a fixed maturity, so the fixed and floating legs of an onchain yield can be priced and traded separately (Pendle docs, Introduction). A yield bearing asset is first wrapped into a Standardised Yield (SY) token, then SY is stripped into PT plus YT, and holding both is economically identical to holding the underlying (Pendle Academy, yield tokenisation basics). PT is described by Pendle itself as "essentially a zero-coupon bond on the underlying asset" that redeems 1:1 at maturity, while the PT holder forgoes the variable yield and points (Pendle docs, PT). YT streams the yield until expiry and then decays to zero, which gives leveraged exposure to a yield or points stream (Pendle docs, YT). Boros, launched in 2025, extends the same idea to perpetual funding rates, where a position "= user has to pay an interest stream and receive another interest stream until a maturity" (Boros Litepaper).
The dominant yield-tokenization market: PT buyers lock a fixed rate, YT buyers go long yield, a true fixed-income primitive for DeFi, with the deepest liquidity and asset coverage in the category.
A yield-bearing asset is wrapped into Standardized Yield (SY, ERC-5115) then split into a Principal Token (PT) and a Yield Token (YT) that trade and redeem independently until maturity.
A specialized AMM that trades PT and YT from a single pool, with time-decaying concentrated liquidity tuned to a market's maturity date.
Vote-escrowed PENDLE (lock up to 2 years): directs incentive emissions across pools, boosts LP rewards, and earns a share of protocol swap fees and YT yield.
Funding-rate yield trading with margin via Yield Units (YU); lets users hedge or speculate on perpetual funding rates. Launched Aug 2025 on Arbitrum.
PENDLE token live 30 Apr 2021, mainnet 17 Jun 2021
RootData PendlePendle V2 (tokenomics launch post dated Nov 29 2022) plus Boros, launched on Arbitrum on 5 August 2025
Pendle V2 tokenomics postUniverum Innovations Inc
Pendle Terms of Use, revised 18 June 2026"an entity established under the laws of the Republic of Panama"; disputes to the Singapore International Arbitration Centre
Pendle Terms of UsePENDLE, locked into vePENDLE for up to 2 years
Pendle docs, vePENDLEvePENDLE gauge voting, snapshotted every Thursday 00:00 UTC, with a 5 percent default and 20 percent maximum pool vote cap. No Snapshot space or Tally instance confirmed in a fetched source: `n.a.`
Pendle docs, vePENDLEEthereum, Arbitrum, Plasma, Monad, Hyperliquid L1, BSC, Base, Sonic, Mantle, Avalanche, OP Mainnet, Berachain
DefiLlama Pendle$935.95m total as of 26 Jul 2026, of which Ethereum $594.57m, Arbitrum $128.82m, Plasma $128.49m, Monad $49.79m, Hyperliquid L1 $21.25m
DefiLlama PendleAckee, Dedaub, Dingbats and "some of the top wardens from Code4rena"
Pendle docs, SecurityImmunefi, maximum $250,000 for critical smart contract, minimum $50,000, PoC required
Immunefi Pendlehttps://docs.pendle.finance
Pendle docs, Introductionhttps://github.com/pendle-finance, 33 repositories
GitHub PendleFees annualised $24.72m, revenue annualised $23.97m, 80 percent of holders revenue to sPENDLE since Sept 2025
DefiLlama PendleClosest analogue
Closest instruments: the zero-coupon bond and the interest rate strip for and , and the interest rate swap for Boros.
Instrument shape
Pendle Finance
is "essentially a zero-coupon bond on the underlying asset", redeemable 1:1 at maturity; collects the yield stream and decays to zero at expiry
TradFi analogue
Zero-coupon bond (principal strip) and interest-only strip from a STRIPS-style separation of a coupon bond
Underwriting
Pendle Finance
None. Any SY-wrappable yield bearing asset can have a market created permissionlessly, with a curated subset surfaced in the UI
TradFi analogue
No credit underwriting at all, closer to a dealer stripping a government bond than to a loan book
Collateral
Pendle Finance
The underlying yield bearing asset backs plus one for one; PT itself is then re-used as collateral on Morpho, Silo and Euler
TradFi analogue
Repo and collateralised lending against strips
Rate setting
Pendle Finance
Market determined. trades at a discount and the implied fixed rate is the discount to par over the remaining term; Boros uses an orderbook with a Mark Rate computed as a TWAP-style oracle
TradFi analogue
Bond price to yield conversion; swap curve set by dealer quotes
Settlement
Pendle Finance
redeems 1:1 for the underlying at maturity; Boros yield units settle against a funding rate fed by an external oracle, for example the "Binance ETHUSDT Funding Rate, 27 Dec 2024 Maturity" market
TradFi analogue
Bond redemption at par; swap cash settlement against a published floating benchmark
Swap leg mechanics
Pendle Finance
Boros positions are explicitly pay-fixed or receive-floating, with initial and maintenance margin and a maintenance margin that "starts at 50% of the initial margin"
TradFi analogue
Vanilla interest rate swap with CCP-style initial and variation margin
Recourse on default
Pendle Finance
No borrower to default. Loss comes from the underlying asset or from Boros margin liquidation, not from a counterparty credit event
TradFi analogue
Unlike a corporate bond there is no issuer recourse; risk is asset and margin risk
Regulation
Pendle Finance
Operated by a Panama entity with arbitration at SIAC, no securities registration or accredited investor gate disclosed
TradFi analogue
Strips and swaps are regulated instruments traded by registered dealers
Seed
4 May 2021$3.7m
Key milestones: launches, upgrades, exploits and governance events.
Pendle V2 tokenomics published, vePENDLE with 1 week to 2 year locks
StatedEstablishes the vote escrow model that routes fees to lockers
SourceCitadels initiative first announced, targeting KYC compliant institutional frameworks and non-EVM chains
StatedBeginning of the institutional distribution push
SourceBoros launches on Arbitrum with $10m notional cap per market and 1.2x leverage cap
StatedExtends Pendle from spot yield to perpetual funding rate trading
SourceTVL peaks at $13.1 billion, with more than $4.6 billion sourced from Ethena yield bearing stablecoins, roughly 35 percent of protocol TVL
StatedPeak scale and peak single-source concentration
Source80 percent of holders revenue begins routing to sPENDLE
StatedChanges the value accrual path for token holders
SourceBoros open interest exceeds $250m for the first time, cumulative notional volume above $7 billion in about four and a half months
StatedBoros becomes a material second business line
SourcesPENDLE upgrade shipped as the response to revenue compression
StatedToken economics reworked as fee income fell
SourceTVL down to roughly $1.5 billion, an 88 percent drawdown over seven months, as sUSDe APY fell to roughly 3.5 percent
StatedThe clearest demonstration that Pendle demand is a derivative of underlying yield levels
SourceGalaxy Curator launches on Fireblocks, tied to Pendle's institutional push
StatedInstitutional custody and curation rails
SourceSecond half 2026 roadmap published; Boros open interest reported at $200m on 22 July
StatedCurrent strategic direction toward RWAs and institutional DeFi
SourceA claim on one unit of the underlying yield bearing asset at maturity, bought at a discount today. Pendle's own documentation calls "essentially a zero-coupon bond on the underlying asset" and states that it can be redeemed 1:1 for the underlying after maturity, with the holder giving up the variable yield and any points in exchange for the fixed discount (Pendle docs, PT).
Not from rate movements, because it redeems 1:1 at maturity, but yes from the underlying asset. plus always equals the underlying, so any impairment of the yield bearing asset flows straight through to the PT (Pendle Academy).
Because yields on the assets Pendle wraps compressed. TVL fell from a September 2025 peak of $13.1 billion to roughly $1.5 billion in late April 2026, an 88 percent drawdown over seven months, alongside sUSDe APY moving from double digits to roughly 3.5 percent (Real World Token Space). Concentration made this worse: more than $4.6 billion of peak TVL, roughly 35 percent, came from Ethena yield bearing stablecoins.
Boros trades perpetual funding rates rather than spot yields. Each Yield Unit "represents the realized funding yield on 1 unit of notional, such as 1 ETH or 1 BTC, until expiry", and positions are structured as paying one interest stream and receiving another until maturity, which is the structure of an interest rate swap (CoinDesk, Boros Litepaper).
PENDLE holders lock into vePENDLE for up to two years, and gauge votes are snapshotted every Thursday at 00:00 UTC with a 5 percent default and 20 percent maximum pool cap (Pendle docs, vePENDLE). Since September 2025 the protocol routes 80 percent of holders revenue to sPENDLE, against annualised revenue of $23.97m (DefiLlama Pendle).
Pendle states its contracts have been audited by Ackee, Dedaub, Dingbats and top Code4rena wardens, with all reports published in the pendle-core-v2-public repository (Pendle docs, Security). The Immunefi programme pays up to $250,000 for a critical smart contract finding with a $50,000 minimum and a mandatory proof of concept (Immunefi Pendle).
The website and protocol are operated by Univerum Innovations Inc, an entity established under the laws of the Republic of Panama, with disputes routed to arbitration under the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (Pendle Terms of Use).
Bull case
PT has become accepted collateral in the largest money markets, with more than $1.6 billion of PT supplied on Aave inside a single month and the PT-sUSDe-31JUL2025 cap raised from $85m to $1.3 billion (LlamaRisk on Aave).
LlamaRisk on AaveBoros scaled fast, exceeding $250m open interest and roughly $7 billion cumulative notional volume within about four and a half months of launch (WEEX report of BlockBeats data).
WEEX report of BlockBeats dataThe addressable pool is enormous relative to current penetration: average open interest in the funding rate market is about $150 billion and Boros accounts for only about 0.1 percent of it (WEEX report of BlockBeats data).
WEEX report of BlockBeats dataPendle settled $45 billion of value for Principal Token holders during 2025 and is pushing into KYC compliant institutional distribution, with Galaxy Curator launching on Fireblocks on 16 July 2026 (Crypto Briefing via Bitget).
Crypto Briefing via BitgetBear case
Demand is a derivative of underlying yield. TVL fell 88 percent from $13.1 billion in September 2025 to roughly $1.5 billion by late April 2026 as sUSDe APY dropped to roughly 3.5 percent (Real World Token Space).
Real World Token SpaceSingle-source concentration risk is structural: more than $4.6 billion of peak TVL, roughly 35 percent, came from Ethena stablecoins (Real World Token Space).
Real World Token SpacePT liquidity is thin relative to the size of the lending exposure it backs, which is why Chaos Labs built a killswitch that sets LTV to zero when 96 percent of PT liquidity concentration thresholds are breached (Chaos Labs). Its own example, PT-eUSDe-29MAY2025 reaching $200m of deposits in 24 hours, shows how fast that exposure can build.
Chaos LabsRevenue is modest against the size of the token economy: annualised revenue is $23.97m on $935.95m of TVL as of 26 July 2026, and the January 2026 sPENDLE upgrade was itself described as the response to revenue compression (DefiLlama Pendle, Real World Token Space).
DefiLlama PendleExternal publications on this protocol: risk assessments, analyst reports, audits and post mortems.
Volatility structured PT pricing with a killswitch that sets LTV to zero at 96 percent PT liquidity concentration, motivated by PT-eUSDe-29MAY2025 hitting $200m in 24 hours
More than $1.6 billion of PT supplied on Aave in a month, with the PT-sUSDe-31JUL2025 supply to liquidity ratio moving from 2.4 to 12.8
Formal Aave process for onboarding PT collateral under an oracle-based risk framework
Boros launched on Arbitrum 5 Aug 2025 with a $10m notional cap per market, 1.2x open interest cap and maintenance margin at 50 percent of initial
80 percent of Boros fees route to vePENDLE, initially covering Binance ETH and BTC perps on Arbitrum
An 88 percent TVL drawdown in seven months tied to yield compression and Ethena concentration
Formal treatment of when tokenised fixed income markets produce admissible price discovery
$935.95m TVL across 12 chains, $24.72m annualised fees and $23.97m annualised revenue
