Securitize and Ethena Labs have switched on a round-the-clock liquidity facility for BlackRock’s USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL), opening it with $50 million and the ability to add the same again within an hour, the two companies announced on Thursday.
The facility lets eligible investors trade BUIDL, BlackRock’s tokenized fund, for stablecoins such as USDC and swap those stablecoins back into BUIDL when banks and traditional markets are shut, weekends included. Securitize operates it and Ethena backs it.
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How the $100 Million Adds Up
The launch pool holds $25 million in USDC and $25 million in BUIDL. As investors draw on that pool, a second $50 million tranche can follow within an hour, the announcement says, lifting the facility to its $100 million maximum capacity.
“With this facility now live, we’re taking another step toward a financial system where institutional investors can access liquidity when they need it, not just when traditional markets are open,” Carlos Domingo, co-founder and CEO of Securitize, said in the announcement.
Guy Young, founder of Ethena Labs, said in the same release that “digital assets operate around the clock, and institutional liquidity needs to keep pace.”
What Unchained Is Watching
Our read: the facility gives institutions that park cash in a tokenized fund but trade in markets that never close a way to get dollar stablecoins on a Saturday without waiting for Monday. How often the second $50 million gets tapped will be an early test of how much weekend demand there really is.
From June Plan to Live Product
The launch follows through on a facility first outlined in June, when Ethena and BlackRock widened their partnership, a deal that also brought Ethena’s synthetic dollar, USDe, onto BlackRock’s Aladdin portfolio and risk system. Ethena’s post on X at the time listed a “liquidity facility on BlackRock tokenized products” among the pieces. Unchained’s June report said holders would be able to move into USDtb as well as USDC; Thursday’s announcement names only USDC.
Securitize and Ethena already work together on BUIDL and USDtb, Ethena’s digital dollar that is mostly backed by BUIDL. Securitize, listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker SECZ, says it manages about $5 billion in assets as of September.
