Classes – By Category

As cryptocurrency lending increasingly continues to become mainstream, questions surrounding this new borrowing and lending concept have begun to rise. Unlike traditional bank loans that entail a lot of bureaucracy and offer near-zero interest rates, bitcoin loans require no paperwork and offer relatively better interest rates for the lenders. Borrowers, on the other hand, don’t need to put up their physical assets as collateral, so long they have crypto assets to back their loans.

If you are looking to invest in this flagship digital currency, you have come to the right place.

In this article, we have compiled a list of the best bitcoin loan sites for cryptocurrency lending and borrowing in 2021, as well as the pros and cons of each.

But before we do that, let’s briefly take a look at the different categories of crypto loans. Shall we?

Different Categories of Crypto Loans

Basically, there are two major categories of crypto loans namely Custodial crypto loans (CeFi) and Non-custodial crypto loans (DeFi).

Let’s briefly dissect each category:

Custodial Crypto (CeFi) Loans

Centralized finance (CEFi) crypto loans are custodial in nature, meaning that the collateralized assets are held by a central entity, and the crypto trader can’t access their collateralized assets as the lender controls their private keys.

Non-custodial (DeFI) crypto loans

Decentralized finance (DeFi) loans are the exact opposite of custodial loans. Rather than relying on a central entity to enforce the loan terms, DeFi loans mainly use smart contracts. As such, if a borrower takes out a DeFi crypto loan, they retain control of their private keys and they can only lose them upon defaulting.

5 Best Bitcoin Loan Platforms

Here’s our list of the best bitcoin loan platforms on the market;

Blockfi

BlockFi is easily one of the best crypto lending sites on the market today. Founded in 2017 by Zac Prince and Flori Marquez, the company that offers fast cryptocurrency-backed loans, a crypto trading platform, and interest-earning cryptocurrency accounts.

In terms of yield, BlockFi offers some of the most competitive rates on the market, all of which are pegged on the loan to value (LTV) ratio of your assets. Here’s a sneak preview of the loan interest rates:

• 50% LTV: 9.75%
• 35% LTV: 7.9%
• 20% LTV: 4.5%

YouHodler 

With operations in the EU and Switzerland, YouHodle is yet another great cryptocurrency platform that allows users to borrow funds against their crypto assets, as well as earn better interest rates on the same. 

It is also one of the few platforms that accept almost every stablecoins as collateral, as well as offers the highest loan to value (LTV) ratio of up to 90%. This means that you can take a fiat loan up to 90% of your crypto assets.

CoinLoan

Headquartered in Estonia, CoinLoan is a peer-to-peer crypto lending platform that caters to both borrowers and lenders, allowing them to access quick crypto-backed loans and earn better interest rates. 

CoinLoan comes with several important features including CoinLoan Borrow, CoinLoan Interest Account, CoinLoan Crypto Exchange, which makes an all-rounded platform for all your crypto needs. 

The loan-to-value (LTV) on the platform range from 20%,35%, 50%, and 70%, with the interest rates for the borrowers varying between 4.95% and 11.95%.

Unchained Capital

Unchained Capital is one of the most uniques CeFi lenders on the market, largely due to its collaborative multisig custody model. This collaborative model delegates three private keys to the borrower, Unchained Capital, and a third-party key agent. This means that the collateralized assets can only be accessed using these three keys.

To use the Unchained Capital platform, borrowers are required to use Trezor, Ledger, or Coldcard hardware wallets. Still, the platform’s higher security is largely attributed to the relatively higher loan-to-value (LTV) of 40%.

Celsius Network 

Celsius Network boasts over $10B in assets and over half a million users. The popularity of this platform is largely fuelled by the super-low borrowing rates and the fact that the platform supports up to 25 stablecoins. At the time of writing this review, the interest rates on the platform were listed between 0.75% and 7.46%, with the LTV rates capped at 50%.

Concluding Remarks: Bitcoin Loans

Bitcoin lending is one of the most revolutionary and game-changing technological advancements in recent times. This revolutionary solution has opened a pandora box door of opportunities for both borrowers and lenders to make passive income. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that new bitcoin lending and borrowing platforms. If you’re looking for a reputable online platform to borrow, trade, or lend your crypto asset, we hope our guide of the 5 best bitcoin loan sites will help.