Figure Technology Solutions is making a bold push to bring more real-world lending onto blockchain rails: the Nasdaq-listed tokenization specialist will acquire AI-driven residential real estate lender Kiavi in a $717 million deal, a transaction that immediately adds roughly $7 billion in annual loan volume to Figure’s platform.
How the deal works
- Figure will buy Kiavi’s technology and operating platform.
- A joint venture with investment firm Sixth Street will acquire Kiavi’s balance-sheet assets.
- Figure says Kiavi will feed more than $100 million in monthly flow into Democratized Prime, its onchain marketplace for credit assets.
Why it matters for crypto and DeFi
Figure plans to migrate Kiavi’s originations and investor-facing processes onto its tokenization stack—Figure Connect and Democratized Prime—so loans can be funded, traded and distributed via blockchain rails. That integration is intended to widen the supply of onchain credit instruments for institutional counterparties and DeFi apps, accelerating Figure’s mission to shift capital markets onto distributed ledgers.
Company framing and leadership
“Figure is relentless in our pursuit of moving the capital markets onto blockchain rails,” CEO Michael Tannenbaum said, calling the Kiavi acquisition “a further pole vault into tokenization, first-lien diversification and our agentic AI platform.” Kiavi CEO Arvind Mohan, who called the transaction a “significant step for the asset class,” is expected to join Figure as chief business officer after close. Executive chairman and co-founder Mike Cagney framed the move as an aggressive expansion required to bring whole asset classes onchain.
Business profile and financials
Figure describes Kiavi as a high-margin, asset-light originator that expands its exposure to residential real estate credit. Company-provided metrics and expected benefits include:
- About $7 billion in added annual loan volume.
- More than $100 million per month of flow into Democratized Prime.
- Internal estimates cited in the announcement: $100B+ total addressable market, $100M+ EBITDA, and an unlevered payback under four years.
Figure also reiterated a medium-term target of a 60% EBITDA margin for the combined business.
Context and recent activity
The acquisition follows a series of tokenization moves by Figure. In May, Animoca-backed Nuva launched an Ethereum marketplace linking roughly $19 billion of Figure-tokenized assets to DeFi, including vaults tied to Figure’s YLDS stablecoin and a home-equity line pool that Nuva reported had funded more than $16 billion. At Consensus Miami, Cagney said Figure is targeting the U.S. first-lien mortgage market—especially loans under $300,000—by using blockchain infrastructure to lower origination costs and speed funding.
Recent performance
Figure has been growing fast: in Q1 2026 it reported $167 million in adjusted net revenue, up 92% year-over-year and slightly above analyst estimates, and loan volume of $2.9 billion—up 113% from Q1 2025.
Market reaction
Despite the acquisition news, Figure shares closed down 0.74% at $28.07 on Wednesday and have fallen about 25.4% over the past month.
Bottom line
For crypto-native markets, the Kiavi deal is a major supply-side event: it brings a large, established pool of residential lending into a company explicitly building infrastructure to tokenize and distribute credit onchain—creating fresh inventory for DeFi integrations and institutional onchain lending products.
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