"" Aave, a leading decentralized lending platform, has announced a governance proposal to bring the Neuberger Securitize High Income Tokenized Fund (HINC) onto its institutional lending platform, Aave Horizon. The proposal, which is currently under review, would make HINC, a high-yield fixed-income strategy fund, the first below-investment-grade credit asset on Aave Horizon.
HINC, which requires a minimum investment of $100,000, is designed for qualified institutional users who want exposure to below-investment-grade credit products while tapping into on-chain borrowing. The fund invests primarily in high-yield corporate bonds, collateralized loan obligations (CLOs), and bank loans, and its onboarding would mark a significant expansion of Aave Horizon's offerings.
If the proposal is successful, HINC holders would be able to borrow stablecoins, including USDC, GHO, and RLUSD, against their fund positions. This would provide a meaningful expansion of what's available as collateral on Aave Horizon, which has historically focused on treasuries and investment-grade instruments.
The addition of HINC would also introduce below-investment-grade credit products to Aave Horizon, moving the platform beyond the safer, more conservative corner of fixed income into territory where yields are higher but so are the risks. The fund's multi-chain integration, which allows it to operate across Avalanche, Ethereum, Solana, and Sui, would also provide institutional participants with flexibility in choosing their preferred blockchain infrastructure.
It's worth noting that the supply-only designation for HINC would limit certain forms of leverage and rehypothecation, which is a sensible guardrail for a fund investing in below-investment-grade instruments.
Aave Horizon's Expansion
The onboarding of HINC would mark a significant expansion of Aave Horizon's offerings, which currently focus on institutional-grade lending. The platform's institutional-grade lending protocol is built on Ethereum and designed for qualified users to borrow stablecoins against tokenized real-world assets. The platform already has hundreds of millions in market size and the onboarding of HINC would further demonstrate its potential as a leading institutional lending platform.
Neuberger Berman and Securitize
Neuberger Berman, the asset manager behind HINC, oversees roughly $230 billion in assets under management. Securitize, which handles the tokenization and infrastructure for HINC, has previously worked with VanEck on its VBILL tokenized treasury fund. The firm has also partnered with Aave on its lending protocol, further solidifying its position as a leading player in the decentralized finance (DeFi) space.
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