Author: Haotian
How do you view the news of @humafinance raising $38 million in financing? It has to be said that in the context of the market becoming increasingly sluggish and lacking new narrative hotspots, Huma's new PayFi concept is truly eye-catching.
So, 1) Why can PayFi become a new topic of focus? 2) Analyze the underlying business logic of Huma's Lending+RWA+PayFi. 3) How is the future extension space of the PayFi track? Next, let me share my thoughts:
1) PayFi is a new narrative concept put forward by the Solana Foundation, essentially an innovative attempt to apply web3 technology (programmable currency and token economics) to the real economy, aiming to expand pure on-chain financial innovation (DeFi) to a broader economic system.
On the one hand, it further implements the financial transformation of RWA physical assets, exploring derivative plays such as "zero net cost shopping," "accounts receivable financing," "cross-border payment settlement," "creator economy," and "supply chain finance";
On the other hand, in the current pure on-chain DeFi, the interest-bearing yield is caught in an awkward situation of stacking leverage. Initiatives such as AVS security consensus commoditization and DA capability commoditization can align with the real-world commercial economy of web2, bringing richer sources of yield to the on-chain world.
In addition, with the successive approval of BTC and ETH spot ETFs, pure on-chain DeFi is facing significant regulatory compliance pressure, and the pure on-chain economy is criticized for not being able to implement infra > application. PayFi, as a new hybrid economic model that not only connects web3 innovative economic models but also has regulatory adaptability in the traditional web2 financial world, will undoubtedly become the narrative focus of new business models and value creation methods.
2) Based on this narrative background, let's analyze why Huma Finance has become the new leader and flagship project of PayFi. Let me summarize in general terms:
Huma is a team from Silicon Valley with rich experience in web2 fintech, initially positioned as a decentralized lending platform, with business models such as Income-Based Loans and revolving credit limits falling under the integrated business category of Lending+RWA.
After acquiring the payment application Arf Financial and beginning business upgrades, based on Arf's compliance qualifications and the rich products and business lines provided to licensed financial institutions for cross-border payments in multiple countries, it is natural that PayFi has become Huma's ultimate financial service goal and vision.
After all, as a comprehensive web3+web2 financial service platform, Huma Finance's product and business logic are also relatively complex. Let me illustrate three highlights:
- Continuously optimized product business lines: HumaV1 mainly provides common credit products such as revolving credit loans and accounts receivable factoring, while HumaV2 adds accounts receivable guarantee credit limits to attract institutional investors. Accounts receivable represent future cash flow income generated by selling goods or providing services in the course of business operations. For example: waiting for payments from automotive parts suppliers, large construction contractors, publishing industry, SaaS software service providers, etc.
Accounts receivable services are sufficient to meet the needs of small and micro-enterprises, while accounts receivable guarantee credit limits provide more flexible fund application scenarios, allowing funds to be withdrawn at any time within the credit limit and can be reused, and will also be flexibly set based on the business situation and future income stability of the enterprise.
Seemingly small financial product upgrades have become more scalable, risk-controllable, and stable products for institutional investors. This can help Huma capture a larger market share and a more diverse user base.
- PayFi Stack modular architecture: This is an open, modular technical architecture built by Huma Finance based on the business characteristics of PayFi, including: transaction layer (Solana, Stellar), currency layer (USDC, PYUSD), custody layer (Fireblocks, Cobo), compliance layer (Chainalysis, Elliptic), financing layer (Huma), application layer (Arf, Raincard).
This is a complex but systematic PayFi applicable stack service, involving a high TPS public chain transaction execution layer and a complex compliance layer with multiple restrictions, and a mature and rich business product line financing agreement layer, which solves most of the barriers for enterprises to enter the PayFi market in one go.
Its existence and the development of Ethereum layer2 OP Stack and Solana's promotion of SOON logic are similar, equivalent to establishing a common framework and standard for the PayFi industry, which can activate technological innovation and business model evolution in the PayFi track.
- Stable real-world APY returns: Unlike most pure DeFi projects that rely on stacking token economic models to maintain basic yield returns, the Huma protocol moves the huge demand for financial products in the off-chain world to the on-chain world, becoming a new breakthrough in breaking the deadlock of pure DeFi returns. For example: the Huma/Arf yield pool provides dynamic returns of 10%-20% to different levels of investors (Senior or Junior), and with platform gains, the APY can exceed 20%.
By providing real-time liquidity solutions for the cross-border payment industry through its subsidiary Arf platform, Huma has tapped into the $40 trillion global cross-border payment market, and by providing high turnover (annual turnover of 50+ times) liquidity support to licensed institutions, it can generate stable annualized returns that are incomparable to pure token incentive models.
Previously, during the RWA narrative boom, Ondo Finance could obtain stable returns with T-Bills (short-term debt instruments of the US government), but with the Fed's interest rate cuts, it will be difficult to maintain this return rate, while Huma's logic of transforming real-world financial financing demand is likely to be more sustainable.
In conclusion,
If there are any new narrative highlights in the market recently, PayFi definitely occupies a place. In addition to its timely emergence to add the possibility of stable returns to pure on-chain DeFi, the key is that its extension space is indeed very rich.
Not limited to cross-border payments, it includes many expandable and imaginatively large application scenarios such as trade finance, supply chain finance, small and micro-enterprise credit, consumer credit, international tuition payments, and more.
However, the PayFi track is still in its early stages of development, and its product line expansion and regulatory uncertainties will require a period of exploration and accumulation. It is a new narrative direction that is worth paying attention to.
免责声明：本文章仅代表作者个人观点，不代表本平台的立场和观点。本文章仅供信息分享，不构成对任何人的任何投资建议。用户与作者之间的任何争议，与本平台无关。如网页中刊载的文章或图片涉及侵权，请提供相关的权利证明和身份证明发送邮件到support@aicoin.com，本平台相关工作人员将会进行核查。
