One module prices the live path. kUSD is minted from USDC at 1:1 by the Peg Stability Module below, with the size-tiered fee shown above, and the module enforces a Chainlink USDC/USD depeg and staleness check on every mint. The current window and the state of that check are published live at kerne.fi/api/risk-status. The hedging venue feeds in the table above price the hedge, not the mint.

Peg Stability Module

Enables 1:1 USDC to kUSD minting at a size-tiered fee: 10 bps is the base rate, and larger mints pay less, down to 5 bps. Call getFee(stable, amount) for the exact rate at a given size, or read params.feeSchedule on /api/psm-status. Redemption of kUSD to USDC is served by the retired reserve PSM (0xFf3025ec). The USDC reserves backing kUSD sit on that reserve PSM and on the retired mint PSM (0x07eBb486); this live mint PSM holds no USDC reserve until mints route through it. Together they hold the kUSD peg near $1.

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Until 11 August 2026 this page published a “kUSD Collateral Availability” table stating that Hyperliquid and Binance accept kUSD as collateral at a 0% haircut, and that Hyperliquid, Binance, Bybit and OKX all pay yield on kUSD. None of that was true. kUSD is not listed on any centralized exchange and no venue accepts it as collateral. The table has been removed rather than corrected, because there was no accurate version of it to publish.

Removed at the same time, for the same reason: a row claiming kUSD is “backed by vault solvency ratio ≥100%” and directly mintable or redeemable at the KerneVault, and an architecture card describing that ratio as confirmation of full backing. The vault holds no shares, so the ratio it returns is a fixed zero-liabilities sentinel rather than a measurement, and the vault holds no minting role over kUSD. Outstanding kUSD is backed one for one by USDC in the Peg Stability Module, which is the row that remains. WETH and stETH were removed from the redemption assets because kUSD is redeemed for USDC and for nothing else.

The “Yield Oracle” row and card were removed for the same reason. They described a contract computing a yield-adjusted NAV from funding rates and staking rewards, updated daily by a keeper. That contract has received four transactions in its entire existence, all on 31 March 2026; its update function has never been called once; its deployed source contains no NAV, funding-rate or staking code; and the vault it would serve has no yield oracle set. It is a deployed contract that has never run, which is not the same thing as an oracle, so it is no longer described as one here.

Every statement above is checkable against Base at the addresses linked on this page. The live protocol reads that supersede the removed claims are published at app.kerne.fi/api/psm-status and kerne.fi/api/risk-status.