World Liberty Financial’s USD1 stablecoin reached a market capitalization of $3.4 billion in January. It also began trading through World Liberty Markets, a new on-chain lending platform launched in January.
World Liberty Markets began operations in January, using infrastructure provided by the DeFi protocol Dolomite. The platform allows users to supply and borrow digital assets on-chain using USD1 as the primary asset. Initial reported on-chain conditions include approximately $20 million in supplied assets, lending rates around 0.83%, and lender yields close to 0.08%.
USD1 is accepted alongside major crypto collateral such as ETH, USDT, and BTC, aiming to create a multi-chain ecosystem with greater capacity and faster settlement. This functional design is intended to attract both retail and institutional counterparties.
Exchange integration has bolstered USD1 liquidity, with reports from late 2025 and early 2026 indicating that Binance added USD1 trading pairs such as BNB/USD1 and ETH/USD1, and began converting certain BUSD reserves into USD1.
How USD1 Connects to On-Chain Lending
World Liberty has framed USD1 as part of a broader plan to unlock over $1 billion of dormant Bitcoin into on-chain lending. The firm has also applied for a National Trust Bank Charter in the US, a regulatory step intended to allow custody, issuance, and conversion to fiat under federal oversight.
At the same time, some questions remain about World Liberty Financial’s capabilities. Reports have pointed to potential political conflicts related to World Liberty’s ownership, and experts have cited standard DeFi risks as limitations to adoption.
For traders and treasury managers, the adoption of USD1 on exchange pairs and within a lending stack changes the liquidity topology: it creates an on-chain stablecoin that can be borrowed against primary crypto collateral and routed through exchange pools.
Key short-term indicators to watch include sustained loan demand beyond incentive-driven flows, peg stability under stress, and progress on the application for a national trust bank charter. These outcomes will determine whether USD1 becomes a reliable infrastructure asset for on-chain lending or remains a controversial and politically sensitive experiment in stablecoin-backed lending.
