Bybit and Franklin Templeton announced a collateral program that permits institutional investors to pledge tokenized shares of Franklin Templeton money market funds while maintaining off-exchange custody of the assets.
Under the arrangement, eligible clients can access credit lines denominated in USDT or USDC stablecoins to trade on Bybit. The structure allows investors to retain their fund holdings and continue earning yield while using those assets to finance cryptocurrency trading activity.
Fund shares are issued through Franklin Templeton's Benji platform. Clients access credit without selling the fund shares or transferring them to the exchange.
The companies also indicated plans to develop a tokenized investment product for wallet users on Bybit and the Mantle network, though specific details have not yet been disclosed.
Market Context
Tokenized money market funds have seen growing institutional adoption. The Bank for International Settlements valued the market at more than $9 billion as of September 2025.
Franklin Templeton's Benji platform held $1.98 billion in assets under management as of April, declining to approximately $669 million according to RWA.xyz data.
BlackRock's USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL) represents the largest tokenized money market fund at $2.2 billion in assets. BUIDL is accepted as collateral on Crypto.com and Deribit, while Binance permits institutional clients to use BUIDL as off-exchange collateral.
