FRAX taps Treasury yields with new staking vault

The decentralized stablecoin project is launching the sFRAX savings vault in a bid to offer users Treasury yields

article-image

Maurice NORBERT/Shutterstock modified by Blockworks

share

With Federal Reserve interest rates at their highest level in 22 years, FRAX announced the launch of sFRAX — a staking vault meant to tap the corresponding hike in Treasury yields.

FRAX is in the process of deploying a raft of “Frax v3” products, and today is launching sFRAX, or “staked FRAX,” alongside a bond product that converts to FRAX’s stablecoin on maturity. Frax founder Sam Kazemian told Blockworks that starting Monday, users will be able to deposit sFRAX and receive 10% yield — which would then shrink to around 5.4%, the Fed’s current IORB rate.

Kazemian said once Federal Reserve interest rates started rising, he realized most stablecoins on the market were only built for low-rate environments — and Frax (FRAX) needed to track interest rates to stay relevant.

“Otherwise, no one will treat your stablecoin as real dollars. They’ll just think of them as play money, and then they’ll sell them for real dollars, or real stablecoins or real T-bill projects,” Kazemian said. 

sFRAX is partly the fruit of FRAX’s August partnership with FinresPBC, which connected FRAX with Kansas City-based Lead Bank to open a brokerage account and begin purchasing Treasury bills.

Frax’s sFrax seems similar in motivation to MakerDAO’s DAI Savings Rate (DSR), a bear market success story that has helped Maker increase its revenue for five straight months by giving DAI holders exposure to Treasury yields, per DeFiLlama. 

But Kazemian thinks Frax’s design is ultimately more sustainable than Maker’s.

DSR rates are akin to a “marketing spend to increase the profits of the DAO,” Kazemian told Blockworks, arguing that Maker’s rates don’t track with the Fed’s. Kazemian said FRAX is perfecting the Treasury-exposed stablecoin.

“It’s not like, ‘hey, let’s just dump a bunch of yield into it and compete with DAI.’ Our view is we want to complete this design,” Kazemian said. “In order to complete a dollar-pegged stable coin, you need a way to bring the Fed yield on-chain.”


Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

Tags

Decoding crypto and the markets. Daily, with Byron Gilliam.

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

recent research

Research Report Templates.png

Research

Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) represent low-hanging fruit in a massive market ripe for Web3-driven disruption. The global CDN market was valued at ~$28B in 2024, and is projected to surpass $140B by 2034, (18.75% CAGR) underscoring the immense demand for efficient content delivery.

article-image

US dollars might technically be worth less, but it’s still good news

article-image

Apps are doing well, as is casino gaming, says Tom Schmidt of Dragonfly

article-image

Sponsored

Machine DeFi brings programmable peer-to-peer finance into contact with tangible machines that generate real-world value

article-image

What happens to your investment portfolio when the companies driving returns are no longer in it?

article-image

Wow, the ETF hype sure didn’t last long

article-image

The private sector lost 33,000 jobs in June; analysts had projected payrolls to add 100,000 positions