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Leading options · 5 ranked of 13 assessed

Crypto-Backed Loans

Crypto-backed loans ranked on whether your bitcoin stays yours if the lender fails, who sets the liquidation price and how long you really get, whether you can compute the total cost before you apply, and which entity becomes your creditor under which licence.

Ranked here: custodial crypto-backed loans, where you post BTC or ETH that a company holds, and borrow fiat or stablecoins against it at interest instead of selling. Not ranked here: DeFi money markets, exchange margin, loans whose collateral never leaves your control, undercollateralised credit, deposit products, crypto cards, property-secured loans and NFT-collateralised lending.

#1 of 5published ranking
Figure
78ChainChoice Score
Why it leads
Figure is 3 points ahead of Ledn, mainly because it scores higher on its margin call and forced sale and its lender of record and lending licence.
Show the arithmetic
Ahead of Ledn on margin call and forced sale (+3.2 points) and lender of record and lending licence (+2.2 points)
Cost
Not priced · No comparable price is published
Reviewed Next review by Published Methodology v2026.11.1
How this page is reviewed

Reviewed means every product ranked on this page was read against its sources on or after that date; every ranked category is re-read at least every 45 days. Models research, extract and parse. A deterministic engine ranks. Every quote passes an adversarial refute pass.

Accountable for this review: Mathias Siemonsmeier, Founder.

How we review · Review calendar · Corrections log · How we make money

No provider can pay for a position in this table. The code that computes this order cannot read which links carry a referral code, and every build proves it. Every score below rebuilds from the published criteria.Ranking v2026.11.1 · 4 criteria · 5 products · same inputs, same order

How we review · 5 ranked of 13 assessed · 4 criteria · 0 sponsor weight

How we review
5ranked
13assessed
4criteria
0sponsor weight
Recommendation first, comparison only if needed.
Reviewed and rechecked on the current cycle.
Commercial relationships disclosed before clickout.
Personal comparison

Crypto-Backed Loans ranked comparison

No comparable price is published; ranking still uses verified product evidence.

RankProviderBest fitScore
1
FigureFigure Markets' binding Terms of Servic...Top ranked
Lender of record and lending licence — 7/10Trade-off: Read 11 November 2026: Figure's product page promises your collateral "will never be...
78score
Check availability for your country

Figure · figure.com. Provider links appear once we know which country you are browsing from: ChainChoice links to providers only where it serves in full.

Commission: This provider pays ChainChoice nothing for this link. Disclosure

Crypto products are high risk. Check the provider is authorised where you live before you deposit.

2
LednLedn publishes its USD loan agreement,...
Computable cost before you apply — 7/10Trade-off: That you no longer own the bitcoin, and that selling it may not end the debt. The fi...
75score
Check availability for your country

Ledn · ledn.io. Provider links appear once we know which country you are browsing from: ChainChoice links to providers only where it serves in full.

Commission: This provider pays ChainChoice nothing for this link. Disclosure

Crypto products are high risk. Check the provider is authorised where you live before you deposit.

3
SALT LendingThe longest-running US crypto-backed le...
Lender of record and lending licence — 7/10Trade-off: That the collateral is not ring-fenced from SALT, and that SALT has stopped letting p...
64score
Check availability for your country

SALT Lending · saltlending.com. Provider links appear once we know which country you are browsing from: ChainChoice links to providers only where it serves in full.

Commission: This provider pays ChainChoice nothing for this link. Disclosure

Crypto products are high risk. Check the provider is authorised where you live before you deposit.

4
NexoNexo's Credit Line is not a secured loa...
Computable cost before you apply — 3/10Trade-off: That you no longer own the bitcoin. The moment coin lands in the Credit Wallet, Exhib...
53score
Check availability for your country

Nexo · nexo.com. Provider links appear once we know which country you are browsing from: ChainChoice links to providers only where it serves in full.

Commission: This provider pays ChainChoice nothing for this link. Disclosure

Crypto products are high risk. Check the provider is authorised where you live before you deposit.

5
MiloA Florida NMLS-licensed direct lender (...
Computable cost before you apply — 7/10Trade-off: That the 'no rehypothecation' promise you chose Milo for is not in any document you w...
52score
Check availability for your country

Milo · milo.io. Provider links appear once we know which country you are browsing from: ChainChoice links to providers only where it serves in full.

Commission: This provider pays ChainChoice nothing for this link. Disclosure

Crypto products are high risk. Check the provider is authorised where you live before you deposit.

Ranking blindCommercial terms excludedDated primary sources

Ranked on 4 published criteria weighted 34/26/22/18, which set goal alignment — 30 of the 86 points. The rest: regional access 20, evidence depth 18 (constant here), ease of use 10 (constant here), institutional trust 8 (constant here). Profile match is shown in breakdowns but carries no weight.

How you can lose money here, and what the ranking scores
  • Oracle failure: a wrong price or outcome liquidates or settles a position.
    Scored by Who sets the price that liquidates you, how long do you really get, and can they sell without telling you? · 26% (Figure 6/10, Ledn 4/10, SALT Lending 6/10)
  • Insolvency failure: the firm or issuer that owes you cannot pay.
    Scored by If the lender fails, is it your bitcoin or theirs — and what may they do with it before then? · 34% (Figure 5/10, Ledn 5/10, SALT Lending 1/10)
  • Regulatory failure: no licence where you are, or a forced market exit.
    Scored by Which entity actually becomes your creditor, and does a register say it may lend? · 18% (Figure 7/10, Ledn 5/10, SALT Lending 7/10)
Not assessed by this ranking: Control failure, Liveness failure, Custody failure, Execution failure, Exit failure, Information failure. A high place says nothing about these; the Methodology tab says what each means.
Also scored, as cost, quality or a summary of several families: Can you compute your total cost, at your tier, before you apply? (22%).
Audit
Infrastructure
Methodology
2026.11.1
published 10 November 2026
Providers tracked
860+
across 121 categories
Last verified
29 September 2026
newest dated pricing or sentiment read
Named on the roster
2 people
managing directors · 6 automated processes
Decision guide

What matters most before choosing in this category

Weighted on collateral title and reuse (34), margin call and forced sale (26), computable cost before you apply (22), and lender of record and lending licence (18). The heaviest question is the simplest one: while the loan is open, is the bitcoin still yours, and may the lender lend it to someone else? Not one of the five clears 5 out of 10 there, and for all five it is their own worst score. Advertised APR is not the axis — a rate you can compute matters, but the coin coming back matters more.

While the loan is open, who holds the bitcoin — and does the contract let them re-pledge or lend it out?
At a margin call, who decides, how much notice do you get, and who sells?
Can you compute the total cost from published numbers before you apply, or only after a call?
Leads on the binding document

The #1 overall and the scoring weights

FigureData checked Sep 2026
Figure Markets' binding Terms of Service keep title to pledged crypto with the borrower and bar its sale, loan or hypothecation unless the borrower instructs it, in a per-loan wallet partition — but Figure's 2025 annual report on Form 10-K says the loan collateral "is in the Company’s control" and that the Company "has the ability to rehypothecate, stake, lend or otherwise use" it, and only that it "does not have a practice" of doing so; no Figure crypto-backed loan agreement is public, so the borrower's insolvency rank is unstated.

Figure Markets' binding Terms of Service keep title to pledged crypto with the borrower and bar its sale, loan or hypothecation unless the borrower instructs it, in a per-loan wallet partition — but Figure's 2025 annual report on Form 10-K says the loan collateral "is in the Company’s control" and that the Company "has the ability to rehypothecate, stake, lend or otherwise use" it, and only that it "does not have a practice" of doing so; no Figure crypto-backed loan agreement is public, so the borrower's insolvency rank is unstated. Strongest on “Which entity actually becomes your creditor, and does a register say it may lend?” (7/10): Figure's licences page names Figure Lending LLC (NMLS ID 1717824) with state licence numbers, effective dates and named regulators, including California Finance Lenders Law License 60DBO-81967; the table is captioned for the Personal Loan, and New York website authorisation is pending. Weakest on “If the lender fails, is it your bitcoin or theirs — and what may they do with it before then?” (5/10): Figure Markets' Terms of Service keep title with the borrower and bar sale, loan or hypothecation of wallet assets unless the borrower instructs it, in a per-loan wallet partition, but Figure's 2025 annual report on Form 10-K says the loan collateral "is in the Company’s control" and that the Company "has the ability to rehypothecate, stake, lend or otherwise use" it, while it "does not have a practice" of doing so; no Figure crypto-backed loan agreement is public, so the borrower's insolvency rank is unstated. Published price: Rate card, verbatim from https://www.figure.com/crypto-backed-loan/ (HTTP 200, 489,319 bytes, fetched 29 September 2026; the strings sit in the page's embedded content data): "12.62% APR (APR includes interest plus applicable fees such as the 1% origination fee)."…

Best forLender of record and lending licence — 7/10
Main tradeoffRead 11 November 2026: Figure's product page promises your collateral "will never be rehypothecated", but Figure's own 2025 annual report (Form 10-K) says the loan collateral "is in the Company’s control" and that the Company "has the ability to rehypothecate, stake, lend or otherwise use" it. It says only that it "does not have a practice" of doing so: a stated practice, not a prohibition.
Verify before signupRate card, verbatim from https://www.figure.com/crypto-backed-loan/ (HTTP 200, 489,319 bytes, fetched 29 September 2026; the strings sit in the page's embedded content data): "12.62% APR (APR includes interest plus applicable fees such as the 1% origination fee)." and "Available interest rates for Figure's Crypto-Backed Loan are 8.91% (9.999% APR) at 50% LTV or 11.50% (12.62% APR) up to 75%." Representative example on the same page: "a borrower receives a Crypto Backed Loan at 50% LTV of $10,000 for a term of 12 months, with an interest rate of 8.91% and a 1% origination fee of $100, for an APR of 9.999%. In this example, the borrower will receive $10,000 and will make 12 monthly payments of $74.25." Minimum: "Crypto Loans starts at a minimum of $5,000, subject to state and jurisdiction-specific legal limitations." The same file's structured data (JSON-LD) still carries an older card: "at a fixed interest rates of 9.9% at 50% or below or 12.4% up to 75%" and "or opt to defer interest for a fee." Disposition cost, https://www.figure.com/faqs/crypto-backed-loans/ (fetched 29 September 2026): "A 2% liquidation fee is applicable in certain regions, which is disclosed in your loan offer documents when a CBL is taken out." Default path, https://www.figure.com/liquidation-protection-disclosures/ (fetched 29 September 2026): borrowers are "opted into an interest-deferral feature" by default and "Accrued interest continues to compound during the deferral period"; the optional Liquidation Protection "Protection Fee" carries no number on any page read. Unchanged from 19 August 2026.
Weighted criteria
If the lender fails, is it your bitcoin or theirs — and what may they do with it before then?34%
Who sets the price that liquidates you, how long do you really get, and can they sell without telling you?26%
Can you compute your total cost, at your tier, before you apply?22%
Which entity actually becomes your creditor, and does a register say it may lend?18%
Methodology

How this category is reviewed

Ranked on four questions: If the lender fails, is it your bitcoin or theirs — and what may they do with it before then? Who sets the price that liquidates you, how long do you really get, and can they sell without telling you? Can you compute your total cost, at your tier, before you apply? Which entity actually becomes your creditor, and does a register say it may lend?

The order on this page is the published ranking for this category. Every criterion, weight and source behind it is on the methodology page.
Frequently asked

Questions people ask before choosing crypto-backed loans

Is my bitcoin still mine while the loan is open?
That is the whole question, and it carries 34 of the 100 points here. It is answered by the loan agreement, not the landing page — and on this page the two disagree more often than not. Two of the five lenders grant themselves an express right to re-pledge, sell or otherwise deal with the borrower's coin in the binding document while their marketing pages deny it, which is why both score 1 out of 10. Read the agreement, and if there is no loan agreement to read, that is the answer.
Why does nobody score above 6 out of 10?
Because the category is graded on documents that bind the lender, and only 8 of the 20 scored cells rest on one — the other 12 rest on marketing pages, FAQs and blog posts. Exactly one lender, Ledn, scores the heaviest criterion against a document whose own URL calls it a loan agreement. The pool mean is 4.58 and the leader is 5.44, and we publish that rather than round it up.
Why is a crypto-backed loan not the same as borrowing on Aave?
Custody. On a DeFi money market the collateral sits in a public contract whose rules and balances anyone can read, and no company can decide to lend it out. Here a company holds your coin and you hold a contractual promise about it. That is a different question with a different failure mode, which is why it is a separate page. The DeFi money markets are ranked under Lending & Borrowing, and every one of them is listed by name with its reason in the 'Considered and not ranked' block on this page.
Are these lenders licensed?
We could not confirm a single one on a public register, and we are publishing that rather than implying otherwise. All five attempts against NMLS Consumer Access or a state regulator failed the same way — an HTTP 403 behind a managed challenge, or a dead API host. So every licensing score on this page rests on what the lender publishes about itself, including the highest one. A blocked register is inconclusive, never proof of a licence and never proof of its absence.
What happens at a margin call?
It varies more than any other mechanic here, which is why it carries 26 points. The questions that separate these lenders are who decides the price, how much notice you get, whether you can top up, and whether the lender sells at its own discretion or by a published rule. A product page that says only 'we will notify you' is not an answer, and is scored as though it were not one.
Reviewed29 September 2026Method4 criteriaCategorycrypto_backed_loans
Not financial advice · For informational purposes only · Always do your own research