Digital asset lender Ledn has tapped Swiss crypto bank Sygnum to refinance its $50 million Bitcoin-backed loan, in a deal that the companies say opens the door to tokenized, Bitcoin-collateralized investment opportunities.

While the refinancing matches Ledn’s $50 million syndicated loan from 2024, the latest facility was twice oversubscribed, the companies said Wednesday. 

An oversubscribed loan offering indicates that investor demand exceeds the available loan allocation, often signaling strong institutional interest. In such cases, investors may receive only a fraction of their requested allocation, or the issuer may increase the loan size to accommodate more capital.

A portion of the loan was tokenized via Sygnum’s Desygnate platform, which allows private credit deals to be issued as onchain investment products. By leveraging tokenization, the facility can be distributed more broadly to qualified investors.

The companies said the oversubscription highlights growing investor demand for inflation-resistant income products, especially as yields in both traditional markets and DeFi continue to flatten.

Earlier this year, DeFi analytics company Neutrl reported evidence of flattening yields, noting that stablecoin APRs had dropped below 6% — a far cry from the double-digit returns investors enjoyed during the previous market cycle before the 2022 bear market.

Ledn isn’t alone in the Bitcoin lending space. In January, Coinbase reintroduced Bitcoin-backed loans for US customers, with Morpho Labs facilitating the lending process. 

In July, Cointelegraph reported that the Cantor Fitzgerald–backed Twenty One Capital was exploring US dollar loans secured by Bitcoin collateral. Meanwhile, JPMorgan Chase is reportedly considering its own Bitcoin-backed loan products, with a potential launch in 2026 — though timelines remain subject to change.

Related: Ledn ditches ETH, shifts to full custody model for Bitcoin loans

Private credit powers tokenization boom

The Sygnum–Ledn facility falls within the tokenized private credit market, now the largest and fastest-growing segment of asset tokenization.

Not all Bitcoin-backed loans qualify as private credit, however. Retail-focused lending products are generally considered outside this category.

According to industry data, private credit currently represents more than half of all tokenized value onchain. As of Wednesday, onchain private credit markets were valued at $15.6 billion, accounting for 58% of the tokenized real-world asset market. 

As Galaxy Digital observed in its April report on crypto lending, onchain private credit “rests on tokenization, programmability, utility, and, as a result, yield expansion.”

Tokenized private credit opportunities typically deliver yields in the 8% to 12% range, according to a June analysis by DeFi protocol Gauntlet and industry platform RWA.xyz.

Related: ‘Before Bitcoin, my most successful investment was shorting the Bolivar’ — Ledn co-founder