Maple Finance Review
Fee split published to the basis point
of 10
Maple is an on-chain asset manager whose Cash Management Pool lends into US Treasuries for a published 50 basis points total — 25 bps protocol fee, 25 bps borrower spread over SOFR. Investments are restricted to Treasury bills, the code is BUSL-1.1, and seven audit firms are named.
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Function
On-chain asset management; Treasury lending pool
Total fee
50 bps: 25 bps protocol, 25 bps borrower spread over SOFR
Backing
US Treasury bills and fully collateralised reverse repos
Licence
BUSL-1.1
Auditors
Trail of Bits, Spearbit, Three Sigma, 0xMacro and others
Scores
Each criterion carries equal weight. The overall score is the average of these 5 scores — (9.0 + 5.0 + 9.0 + 7.0 + 3.0) ÷ 5 = 6.6.
Pros
- Fee published to the basis point: 50 bps total, 25 bps protocol and 25 bps borrower spread over SOFR
- Function stated plainly: on-chain asset management with digital-asset lending and yield products
- Borrower investments strictly limited to US Treasury bills and fully collateralised reverse repos
- Seven audit firms named and dated, including Trail of Bits, Spearbit, Three Sigma and 0xMacro
Cons
- The core repository is Business Source License 1.1, not open source today
- Whether the Treasury backing is attested or verified on-chain is not stated
- Governance and upgradeability are not stated on the pages read
- The Cash Management Pool is permissioned rather than open
A fee split to the basis point
Maple's Cash Management Pool publishes its cost precisely: 50 basis points annualised in total, comprising a 25 bps Maple protocol fee for the smart-contract infrastructure and a 25 bps borrower fee set as a fixed spread between the borrowing rate and the SOFR benchmark. Naming both components and the benchmark is the clearest fee disclosure in this category.
Restricted, named backing
The borrower's permitted investments are strictly limited to US Treasury bills and reverse repurchase agreements fully collateralised by Treasury bills, restricted through a Master Loan Agreement. Whether that is attested or verified on-chain is not stated, which is the one gap in an otherwise strong backing disclosure.
Licence and audits
The maple-core-v2 repository is Business Source License 1.1, so not open source today, while seven audit firms are named and dated — Trail of Bits, Spearbit, Three Sigma, 0xMacro and others — a solid audit trail.
Who builds it
Maple was founded in 2019 and, in its own words, is built by "former bankers and credit investment professionals"; the documentation describes the team by background rather than naming individuals. Governance and incentives now centre on the SYRUP token. That framing — a credit desk's experience foregrounded, the people behind it left unnamed on the docs — is worth keeping in mind for a protocol whose business is underwriting institutional loans.
How it compares
Reserve
Tokenised index baskets under a permissive licence
Term Finance
Fixed-rate lending, six named audits, restrictive licence
dHEDGE
AGPL vaults with a deep audit list, now rebranding
Derive (formerly Lyra)
Options fees published in full, Sigma Prime audited
Goldfinch
On-chain credit, MIT, Trail of Bits audited
Index Coop
Per-product fees published, Apache-licensed
Nexus Mutual
On-chain capital pool, GPL-licensed
Synthetix
MIT-licensed with a published fee schedule
Ondo Finance
Thirteen named auditors on tokenised Treasuries
Sources
Scored from published primary sources rather than hands-on use. Every figure above comes from one of the pages below, on the date shown. Manufacturers change prices and specifications without notice — if something here no longer matches the source, tell us and we will correct it.
- 1.Maple — Cash Management Pool lending (fees and backing) — checked
- 2.Maple — core-v2 LICENSE (BUSL-1.1) — checked
- 3.Maple — v2 audits — checked
- 4.Maple Finance — documentation — checked
Frequently asked questions
What does Maple's Cash Management Pool charge?
50 basis points annualised in total: a 25 bps Maple protocol fee and a 25 bps borrower spread over the SOFR benchmark.
What backs Maple's Cash Management Pool?
Borrower investments are strictly limited to US Treasury bills and reverse repos fully collateralised by Treasury bills; whether this is attested on-chain is not stated.
Nothing here is financial advice. Editorial policy · How we score · How we're funded.