Borrowing

Borrowers can initiate a loan by tranching their collateral, and then selling their safe tranches to lenders for cash. As explained in the user guide, Borrowers can either 'Sell Bonds' on the spot market, or place an 'Ask Order' by providing liquidity at their desired price.

Example

• A user wants to borrow $1000 using AMPL as collateral

• There is an AMPL bond currently available with the following state:

  • Matures in 6 months

  • 20/30/50 ratios

  • The A-Tranche is currently trading for a slight discount of $0.90

  • The B-Tranche is currently trading for a larger discount of $0.70

Now the user has a range of choices which trade-off collateralization rate for interest rate:

Low collateralization, high interest

• The borrower deposits 2600 AMPL

• In return they receive:

  • 520 A-Tranches (2600 * 0.2)

  • 780 B-Tranches (2600 * 0.3)

  • 1300 Z-Tranches (2600 * 0.5)

• They sell all of their A-Tranches for $468 (520 * 0.90)

• They sell all of their B-Tranches for $546 (780 * 0.70)

• They now have the following:

  • $1014 in cash from selling their tranche tokens

  • 1300 Z-tranches, representing an expected future value of 1300 AMPL, plus/minus all of the next 5-6 months of AMPL value changes

• They paid an "interest rate" of ~22% ((1300 - 1014) / (1300))

High collateralization, low interest

• The borrower deposits 6000 AMPL

• In return they receive:

  • 1200 A-Tranches (6000 * 0.2)

  • 1800 B-Tranches (6000 * 0.3)

  • 3000 Z-Tranches (6000 * 0.5)

• They sell all of their A-Tranches for $1080 (1200 * 0.9)

• They now have the following:

  • $1080 in cash from selling their A-Tranche tokens

  • 1800 B-Tranches, representing a likely future value of 1800 AMPL

  • 3000 Z-Tranches, representing a future value of 3000 AMPL, plus/minus all of the next 5-6 months of AMPL value changes

• They paid an "interest rate" of 10% ((1200 - 1080) / (1200))