Agora Finance

Agora Finance is the issuer of AUSD, a US dollar stablecoin designed for institutional and business use across both crypto-native and traditional finance contexts. Founded in December 2023 by Nick van Eck (CEO), Drake Evans (CTO), and Joe McGrady (COO), Agora launched AUSD on July 7, 2024 and has since grown to over 200 million AUSD in circulation across 45 billion in total asset transfer volume.

How AUSD Works

AUSD is minted 1:1 with USD fiat deposits. Reserves are held in a segregated, bankruptcy-remote trust and consist of cash, overnight repurchase agreements, and short-duration US Treasury bills. VanEck manages the reserve fund; State Street serves as the primary custodian. Monthly attestations are prepared by Grant Thornton LLP under AICPA standards.

Unlike bridged or synthetically-issued stablecoins, AUSD is issued natively on each supported chain. This avoids the liquidity fragmentation and counterparty dependencies that come with wrapped representations. The token is ERC-20 standard on EVM chains and has a corresponding native deployment on Solana and other non-EVM networks.

The Stablecoin 3.0 Model

The defining characteristic of Agora's approach is what the company calls the "Stablecoin 3.0" model. Earlier stablecoin issuers retained the yield earned on backing reserves, while businesses that drove adoption received nothing. Agora reverses this by sharing a meaningful portion of reserve yield with ecosystem partners — exchanges, trading firms, wallets, market makers, and fintech applications that integrate AUSD.

According to Agora, integrated partners can receive seven-figure annual payments under this arrangement. The model is explicitly contrasted with yield-bearing stablecoins (tokens like sDAI or stETH-based instruments), which Agora's founders argue function more like investment products than payment infrastructure and carry securities-classification risk that limits their adoption.

Product Suite

AUSD is Agora's core product — a freely tradable, dollar-pegged stablecoin with institutional-grade reserve management. It is designed to function as money: liquid, predictable, and suitable for payments, settlements, and cross-border transfers.

Instant Liquidity enables atomic minting of AUSD against USDC or USDT with no slippage at the minting layer, allowing businesses and integrators to acquire AUSD directly without relying on secondary market depth.

Agora Stable Swaps is a fixed-price swap protocol for verified users. Pairs are deployed across supported networks via a factory contract architecture. Swaps execute at a fixed price with configurable fees, eliminating the slippage inherent in AMM-based stablecoin pools.

White-labeled Stablecoins allow businesses to launch custom branded stablecoins using Agora's infrastructure in as little as a day. The architecture uses ERC-4626 vault contracts, meaning white-label stablecoins are backed by AUSD reserves and inherit Agora's compliance and attestation framework.

Agora Public API exposes minting, redemption, account management, and transaction monitoring programmatically. This allows businesses to integrate Agora's payment and treasury infrastructure directly into their own products.

Solana Ecosystem Integration

AUSD launched on Solana with initial native issuance and integration across major Solana protocols including Orca, Kamino Finance, Drift Protocol, Jupiter Exchange, and Raydium. This gives AUSD immediate utility for trading, lending, and liquidity provision within Solana's DeFi ecosystem.

Cross-chain interoperability is powered by Wormhole's Native Token Transfers (NTT) framework, which Agora selected as its primary bridge infrastructure in October 2024. NTT preserves token properties across chains and avoids the liquidity fragmentation associated with traditional lock-and-mint bridges, ensuring that AUSD circulating on Solana represents the same economic exposure as AUSD on Ethereum or any other supported network.

Security and Audits

Agora's smart contracts have been reviewed by multiple independent security firms: Cantina Spearbit, Certora, Zellic, MoveBit, and Halborn. The AUSD token contract supports role-based access control with distinct Admin, Pauser, Freezer, Minter, and Burner roles. The contract also includes advanced ERC features: EIP-712 typed data signing, ERC-1271 for smart contract wallet validation, ERC-2612 permits, and ERC-3009 for gasless transfers. Reserve attestations are published monthly, and full audit reports are available in the developer documentation.

Team and Funding

Agora was co-founded by Nick van Eck, Drake Evans, and Joe McGrady. Van Eck serves as CEO and is the primary public voice on Agora's stablecoin thesis. The company raised a 12 million USD seed round in April 2024 led by Dragonfly, with participation from General Catalyst, Hack VC, Kraken Ventures, Mirana Ventures, Mantle EcoFund, Foresight Ventures, Wintermute Ventures, Galaxy, and Consensys. A 50 million USD Series A followed, led by Paradigm with additional participation from Dragonfly.

Context

Agora operates in a market dominated by Tether (USDT) and Circle (USDC), both of which retain reserve yield as issuer profit. Agora's bet is that revenue-sharing creates stronger distribution incentives and builds a more durable partner network. The GENIUS Act and broader stablecoin regulatory momentum in the US is a tailwind: AUSD's structure — 1:1 fiat-backed, fully attested, not yield-bearing at the user level — positions it well under any regulatory framework that treats payment stablecoins differently from yield-bearing digital assets. Van Eck has noted publicly that the international opportunity for dollar-denominated stablecoins substantially exceeds the US market, and AUSD's multi-chain native issuance strategy reflects that ambition.