The funds you put into the pool are separated from the money the borrowing business actually receives by multiple layers of fees and structural costs. You may see an advertised 15% annualized return, but the borrowing business could end up paying far more than that total.
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Based on Sugarc's demo solution, borrowing businesses can get up to roughly 95% of the invoice face value when using tokenized invoice financing, with the remaining portion deducted as upfront discounts and fees. But this is only a reference value at the platform level, and real-world deployed projects will stack on even more cost layers.
What happens to your money from the moment you deposit USDC to when the business receives funds
The full capital flow is split into three stages: your deposit → platform allocation → fund delivery to the business.
Stage 1: You deposit stablecoins, and the platform deducts the first layer of fees
Clearpool's trade financing vault is a typical structure: USDC holders deposit funds into the vault, the capital is deployed to trade financing deals, and returns flow back to depositors. The platform takes protocol fees from the total capital pool directly. Clearpool charges 0.5% to 2% in processing fees for traditional loans, and this portion is deducted directly from the pool's returns, not charged to the borrower.
Stage 2: Capital passes through SPV and legal structures, incurring the second layer of costs
Most RWA credit products hold underlying assets through an SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle), and this legal structure itself generates operating costs. Huma Finance's SPV structure is transparent to LP investors, but the SPV has strict contractual requirements: it must deduct all monthly operating costs and investor-allocated fees before retaining a 2.5% yield, otherwise the SPV is considered in default. These operating costs cover custodian bank fees, legal and compliance fees, audit fees and other expenses, directly reducing the total amount of capital in the pool available for lending.
Stage 3: The final amount the business receives in hand
Sugarc's case shows that businesses can receive up to 95% of the invoice face value as an advance USDC payment after uploading their invoices. Clearpool's trade financing vault also uses tokenized invoices, purchase orders and letters of credit as underlying assets, which is essentially a crypto-native version of traditional factoring services.
But the 5% to 15% gap between the invoice face value and the advanced payment is only the visible discount, the actual situation can be far more complex:
Capital usage rate difference: Not all money in the pool is 100% put to use. When large amounts of new capital flow in, the short-term capital usage rate may drop to 70%, and it usually stays around 80% to 90% under normal circumstances, almost never reaching 100%. This means even if 1 million USDC is deposited into the pool, only 800,000 to 900,000 USDC may actually be used for lending, while the borrowing business sees a much larger "available credit line" when applying.
Interest calculated by total line, not actual used amount: Huma's case notes that clients need to pay fees based on a 10 million USDC credit line even if they only use 8 million USDC of it. This "committed credit line" system means the business's actual capital cost can be far higher than the advertised nominal interest rate.
Fluctuation factors for the actual received amount
Different protocols have very different lending ratios and fee structures. Sugarc's 95% upper limit is just a reference value, in actual operations it depends on the credit risk of the invoice buyer, the invoice payment period, the borrowing business's credit history and other factors. Protocols like Clearpool and Centrifuge offer LP yields between 6% and 15%, and the profit margin the platform takes in between directly determines how much money the business actually gets.
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Verification method after the process is completed
If you are investing in a tokenized invoice pool and want to confirm how much money the business actually received, you can check following these steps:
Find the underlying asset details disclosed by the project party — protocols like Clearpool work with institutions such as Cicada Credit as portfolio managers in charge of risk management and underwriting, who usually disclose capital allocation details. Check the pool's "capital usage rate" data, which directly impacts how much capital actually flows to the borrower.
Confirm the full fee structure — check if the platform deducts management fees (such as 0.5% to 2%) from the capital pool, and if there are extra operating costs at the SPV level. These fees are usually stated in project documents or governance proposals. Huma's SPV requirement for positive monthly net profit and mandatory 2.5% yield retention is already a fixed cost line.
If you have access to relevant data, verify the gap between the "loan disbursement amount" and "invoice face value" of the latest financing deal — Sugarc's 95% rule means a maximum 5% deduction, but real projects can have higher gaps. This gap is the real cost the business pays to get funds ahead of the original invoice payment date.
