Borrow against WBTC
Teller pools accept WBTC as collateral at up to 66.7% LTV, lending USDC at 15% APR. Every loan is fixed-term with no margin-call, so a price fall during the loan cannot liquidate your collateral.
| Collateral | Network | LTV | APR |
|---|---|---|---|
| WBTC | Ethereum | 66.7% | 15% |
Pool data read . Rates and LTVs are set per pool and change when operators change them.
Where the WBTC liquidity sits
Ethereum mainnet carries the WBTC book: 1 pool at 66.7% LTV and 15% APR, and that pool takes the mainnet contract alone.
At 66.7%, one WBTC backs a loan of about the ceiling shown above in USDC. Bitcoin collateral gets a higher ceiling than most assets on the platform because the pools treat it as bluechip, and only WETH on mainnet is set higher.
WBTC is custodial, and that matters here
WBTC lives at 0x2260fac5e5542a773aa44fbcfedf7c193bc2c599 on Ethereum and carries 8 decimals rather than the usual 18. BitGo holds the underlying bitcoin, and merchants mint and burn against it. Your loan therefore carries two counterparties: the Teller pool that holds the collateral, and the custodian that backs the token itself.
Those 8 decimals cause a specific problem worth knowing about. Several wallet-scaled fields in the upstream pool matrix divide raw balances by 1e18 regardless of the token, so they collapse toward zero for 8-decimal collateral. Teller reads the pool contract directly for the numbers that gate a borrow, which is why the figure in the table and the figure in the borrow sheet agree.
WBTC or cbBTC
Both wrap bitcoin, both get the same collateral ratio from Teller pools, and they price within a few dollars of each other. The rate is where they part company: the Base cbBTC pool has been quoting close to 1% while this mainnet WBTC pool quotes 15%. If you hold neither yet, read the cbBTC page before you pick a wrapper, and note that gas on Base costs cents against mainnet’s dollars.
The loan itself
Deposit WBTC, receive USDC, repay or roll at the due date. No margin call arrives in between, whatever bitcoin does, because the term is fixed and the pool has no liquidation threshold to cross. Miss the due date and the collateral is forfeit, so the risk you are managing is a calendar risk. Borrowing is generally not a taxable disposal in the US, unlike selling; the crypto lending tax guide covers the detail.
Frequently asked questions
Not directly. Teller pools hold ERC-20 collateral, so bitcoin has to be wrapped first, as WBTC on Ethereum or cbBTC on Base. Both represent one bitcoin each and both are accepted at the same collateral ratio.
WBTC is custodial: BitGo holds the underlying bitcoin and merchants mint against it. That adds a counterparty to your loan alongside the Teller pool. The wrapper has held its peg since 2019, though custody risk is real and worth pricing.
Nothing happens to the loan. Fixed-term Teller loans have no liquidation threshold during the term, so no margin call can arrive mid-drawdown. The due date is the obligation, not the price.
Different pools, different operators, different rates. The Base cbBTC pool has been quoting near 1% while the mainnet WBTC pool quotes 15%. Both use the same collateral ratio, so the wrapper you hold changes the price of the loan.
Up to the max LTV shown in the table above, against the live bitcoin price. The pool enforces the ceiling on-chain, and the borrow sheet reads that contract directly rather than trusting a cached estimate.
Open a loan
Connect a wallet, deposit your collateral, and borrow a stablecoin. No credit check, no application.
Go to the borrow tab →No collateral to pledge? Check whether you pre-qualify for a no-collateral personal loan. Soft check, no hard pull.