Kasu

Kasu is a real-world asset (RWA) infrastructure platform that combines decentralised finance and traditional finance capital across the funding lifecycle of lending businesses, which it calls Credit Originators. Retail and institutional lenders deploy USDC into Lending Strategies operated by these originators, whose loans are made to creditworthy operating businesses ("End Borrowers"). The protocol positions itself as giving everyday DeFi participants access to private credit yields alongside institutional credit funds, advertising a 15%-25% APY range across a spectrum of risk-return options.

Each Lending Strategy is divided into up to three loan tranches — Junior, Mezzanine and Senior — with distinct positions in the capital structure governing loss apportionment and recovery. Transactions run in weekly epochs with a clearing period within 48 hours of each epoch's end, batching lending and withdrawal requests so protocol algorithms can manage liquidity surpluses and shortages while reducing on-chain transaction volume. Lenders deploying under 350,000 USDC are not pooled: they are told which End Borrowers their funds are lent to and may opt out before deployment. Additional risk architecture includes security/collateral structuring, covenants and undertakings, first-loss capital and risk reporting dashboards. KYC/KYB is required to become a lender.

The protocol has a native token, $KASU, which is not required to lend but which, when locked for minimum amounts and periods, places lenders into tiered Loyalty Levels conferring priority access to oversubscribed strategies, priority withdrawal, yield bonuses and protocol fee sharing. Company documentation states the $KASU token generation event had not yet occurred at the time of writing.

Founding story

Kasu was formed as an exclusive joint venture between Faculty Group, a group of blockchain-native firms spanning strategy, token modelling, branding, market making, business development and capital, and Apxium Technologies, an Australian SaaS and fintech company founded and led by CEO Jeremy Coombe. Faculty Group Founding Partner Luke Lombe framed the venture as applying accounts receivable automation financing technology to RWA lending so that capital is advanced only against an optimised debtor book.

Business model

Kasu operates a lending protocol intermediating between capital providers and lending businesses. Credit Originators, which are exclusive to Kasu, source and underwrite loans to real-world business borrowers; DeFi and institutional lenders supply USDC; TradFi asset managers gain access to deal flow. The protocol layers accounts receivable automation software and payments technology onto End Borrowers to improve cash flow and credit risk. A native $KASU token provides utility and rewards, including protocol fee sharing, to lenders who lock it.

Documentation references protocol fees, a portion of which is shared with lenders who lock $KASU tokens and reach designated Loyalty Levels.

Traction

Company materials cite Apxium's management of over $2 billion in annual invoice transaction volume across the US, UK, Canada and Australia and no losses on invoice lending over seven years, translating into a stated first-year invoice financing opportunity of approximately $150 million for Kasu, with a further $7.5 billion of invoices potentially fundable through those firms' existing client books. The platform was reported in January 2024 as targeting launch in Q2 2024.

Latest developments

In January 2024 Kasu announced a $3 million seed round co-led by Woodstock, Morningstar Ventures and Faculty Group, with proceeds directed at building out the platform, and indicated a Q2 2024 launch for its risk-optimised RWA yield platform. Protocol documentation states the $KASU token generation event has yet to occur.