Pencil Finance, the student loan real-world-asset (RWA) protocol on EDU Chain that we are co-incubating with HackQuest, today announced that we, along with Open Campus, have deployed US$10 million in liquidity as loan collateral to facilitate DeFi student loans on the Pencil Finance platform.

Yat Siu, our co-founder and executive chairman, said: “Blockchain is redefining how education is funded and developed. By bringing student loans on-chain, this initiative seeks to boost transparency, efficiency, and Web3 adoption for potentially hundreds of millions of students globally, while also increasing financial literacy. We believe this will have very significant implications for the US$3 trillion student loan market.”

Frank Li, co-founder of Pencil Finance, said: “Blockchain technology allows us to reimagine student lending from the ground up. By bringing loans on-chain, we deliver transparency, efficiency, and access at a global scale, helping students everywhere unlock new educational opportunities.”

Harry Zhang, co-founder and CMO of HackQuest, said: ‘This milestone demonstrates the real-world impact of blockchain in education. On-chain loans empower students and open new opportunities for investors.”