Aave Proposes V4 Loans Against Bitcoin Held With Anchorage

Aave Labs is proposing Aave V4 loans against Bitcoin held with Anchorage, publishing an ARFC on September 14, 2026, that would let institutions borrow stablecoins against BTC pledged in Anchorage custody. The plan remains a proposal, not a live market, with final risk terms and governance approval still pending.

What Aave proposes for Aave V4 Bitcoin loans

Aave Labs published the ARFC titled “Custodied Collateral Lending: Aave V4 Isolated Hub & Spoke” on September 14, 2026, seeking approval for an institutional stablecoin lending deployment. The design is separate from Aave’s standard pooled markets, echoing the protocol’s broader V4 direction seen in an earlier V4 proposal on DAO funds and bad debt.

What the proposed loans would involve

The initial proposed listing is a single Custodied Collateral Token (CoCT) instance representing BTC pledged as collateral. Borrowing would route stablecoins to the borrower atomically, while repayment reduces protocol debt without automatically releasing collateral. For related coverage, see KULR Sells Remaining 764 Bitcoin for $59M, Exits BTC Treasury.

The proposal scopes one isolated Hub and one collateral Spoke under Aave DAO governance, with stablecoin liquidity entering through a separate lender-facing Spoke. That isolation walls the market off from reserves on other Hubs, unlike a shared pool such as the Aave USDT0 pool on Monad.

A structural listing control sits at the center of the design: the proposal sets a permanent CoCT draw cap of zero for every Spoke on the isolated Hub, alongside non-borrowable CoCT reserves, so collateral receipt tokens cannot be borrowed out.

Proposed permanent CoCT draw cap

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Proposal status and availability

The stated governance path is community feedback, a Snapshot vote if sentiment is positive, and an AIP for onchain approval and execution if Snapshot passes. The fetched proposal does not establish completed approval or launch, so the loans are not yet available to borrowers.

Bitcoin held with Anchorage: the custody question

Bitcoin traded near $75,823, down about 2.35% over 24 hours, at the research snapshot; the proposal itself makes no causal claim on price. BTC has been under pressure this month, having fallen toward $75,000 around a Senate CLARITY Act vote.

Anchorage’s stated role

Under the proposed model, Anchorage holds the underlying collateral throughout the loan lifecycle and is the borrower’s counterparty under an Account Control Agreement. The collateral is not held by Aave or Chainlink.

Anchorage is a chartered institution: on January 13, 2021, the OCC announced conditional approval of Anchorage Trust Company’s conversion to Anchorage Digital Bank, National Association, granting a national trust bank charter subject to an operating agreement. That historical charter is context only and is not regulatory approval of this Aave market.

How the Bitcoin would support the loans

CoCT is a transfer-restricted ERC-20 accounting unit, not a tradable claim on BTC, with a transfer allowlist covering the Hub, Spoke and CustodySync. Aave Labs described the token’s narrow purpose in the proposal.

“CoCT is an internal accounting unit required to interface with Aave V4’s ERC-20 collateral interface. It is not a tradable or transferable representation of the custodied asset and carries no direct claim on it; legal recourse runs through the collateral Account Control Agreement.”

Aave Labs, governance forum

Chainlink-designed CustodySync alone may mint or burn CoCT, with CRE workflows reconciling custody records against onchain state via Proof of Reserve and collateral-price infrastructure. Liquidation would use an Anchorage OTC collateral sale, support partial liquidations, and settle through an atomic transaction that repays debt, withdraws and burns CoCT, and clears the liquidation commitment.

Which lending terms and next steps need confirmation?

Borrower eligibility and loan terms

Collateral factor, liquidation bonus and fee, target health factor, supply and borrow caps, interest-rate strategy and oracle configuration are to be recommended by risk providers in a subsequent AIP. Eligible borrowers, jurisdictions, and specific stablecoin listings are not established in the fetched evidence and require source confirmation.

Approval and rollout milestones

Onboarding a borrower requires four permissioned actions on DAO-controlled contracts: add CoCT as a Hub asset, add the Spoke with an add cap, add the collateral reserve, and set its price source. The current design requires governance to add each new CoCT instance.

Permissioned onboarding actions per borrower

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What to watch next: a Snapshot vote if forum sentiment turns positive, followed by an AIP carrying the final risk parameters. Until those steps clear, no deployed market, loan pricing, or launch date is documented; the proposal marks intent, not availability. Governance appetite for institutional custody structures also matters, as seen in unrelated DeFi restructuring votes like the Balancer shutdown proposal.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice. Cryptocurrency and digital asset markets carry significant risk. Always do your own research before making decisions.