Maple Finance Now Lets Institutions Borrow Against Restaked Ethereum
Maple Finance, one of the bigger names in decentralized lending, just made a move that could matter for institutions dabbling in Ethereum staking. Starting today, borrowers can use EtherFi’s weETH—a token tied to restaked ETH—as collateral to secure loans.
It’s not exactly small-scale stuff. Loans start at $5 million, run for two months, and come with a temporary perk: a 2% APY rebate in ETHFI tokens for the first $50 million borrowed. The catch? You’ve got to put up more collateral than the loan’s worth. This seems aimed at funds, treasury managers, and others knee-deep in Ethereum’s staking economy.
Why This Matters
Restaking has gone from a weird crypto experiment to something a lot of people are taking seriously. EtherFi’s weETH, for example, is already sitting on over $5.3 billion in supply, with most of it locked up as collateral elsewhere. Now, Maple’s giving institutions a way to borrow against it without losing their staking rewards.
Sid Powell, Maple’s CEO, put it bluntly: “Restaking isn’t just about yield anymore. It’s becoming part of how credit works on-chain.” He’s got a point—if you’re a fund holding a pile of weETH, you might not want to sell it. But you might need liquidity. This deal lets you have both.
Bigger Picture for Maple
This isn’t Maple’s first rodeo with staked ETH. Just two weeks back, they teamed up with Lido Finance to offer loans backed by stETH. That partnership made sense—Lido’s the giant in liquid staking, with over $22 billion locked up. But the EtherFi move feels different. It’s betting that restaking, not just plain old staking, is where the institutional action will be.
And Maple’s having a solid year. Their total value locked (TVL) has jumped by $2 billion since January. Their token, SYRUP, is up 25% in a week—though, to be fair, crypto tokens do that sometimes.
The real question is whether institutions will bite. Restaking’s still new enough that some might hesitate. But if they do, this could be one of those quiet-but-important steps toward making DeFi feel less like a casino and more like, well, finance.
Either way, it’s clear Maple’s not waiting around to find out.
