Inflation-Aware Currencies for the Global Economy
USDi is the inflation-linked digital cash — a new unit of account designed to preserve purchasing power as prices change.
Built to track U.S. inflation and operate natively on-chain.
Rethinking Money
When Prices Change, Money Should Too
Inflation hedging today is complicated. Investors and institutions rely on layered portfolios, complex strategies, and financial engineering simply to preserve purchasing power.
But inflation risk is universal. Everyone is born with it.
What if money itself could respond to inflation?
Inflation protection should be native to money itself.
The Asset
USDi: The Inflation-Linked Digital Cash
USDi is a digitally native unit of account designed to track U.S. CPI and preserve purchasing power over time. Unlike traditional digital dollars that remain nominally stable, USDi adjusts alongside inflation — aligning money with real economic conditions.
Direct CPI Tracking
Designed to track the U.S. Consumer Price Index with precision and transparency.
Liquid On-Chain Unit of Account
A fully liquid digital asset that can move across global financial markets without restriction.
Preserves Real Purchasing Power
Maintains economic value as prices rise — money that works as hard as you do.
No Duration Risk
No lockups and no engineered yield — simply inflation-aware cash that's always accessible.
Infrastructure & Design
Built for Transparency and Financial Integrity
USDi is designed to combine traditional financial safeguards with crypto-native infrastructure.
Backed by Real-World Assets
USDi reserves are supported by real-world assets aligned with its inflation-tracking structure.
Transparent Third-Party Audits
Independent verification provides transparency around reserves and system integrity.
Crypto-Native Architecture
USDi operates fully on-chain, enabling seamless integration with digital asset markets and financial infrastructure.
The Vision
The Beginning of an Inflation-Aware Monetary System
USDi begins with the U.S. Consumer Price Index, one of the most trusted and widely referenced inflation benchmarks in the world.
The long-term vision is a global system of inflation-aware currencies and markets. Over time, this framework enables entirely new financial primitives based on inflation data.
Future deployments may include:
Use Cases
How USDi Is Used
Settlement & Trade
Inflation-aware cash for financial transactions and capital flows — settlement that preserves real value.
Real Return Portfolios
Combine USDi with assets such as Bitcoin, gold, and tokenized real-world assets for real-return strategies.
DeFi Foundations
Serve as a base asset for decentralized finance strategies seeking real yields above inflation.
Inflation Sector Markets (Future)
Trade exposure to specific inflation components such as healthcare, education, energy, and housing.
Ecosystem
Access USDi Today
Trade, custody, and integrate USDi through trusted partners in the ecosystem.
Who USDi Is For
Built for Builders, Protocols & Institutions
Institutions
Hedge inflation exposure in settlement, trading, and portfolio strategies with a fully liquid, on-chain instrument.
DeFi Protocols
Integrate inflation-aware financial primitives into on-chain markets and build real-yield products.
Innovators
Build the next generation of inflation-linked currencies and financial products on top of USDi infrastructure.
Team
The Team Behind USDi
Decades of expertise in financial markets, inflation derivatives, technology, and blockchain — united by a mission to build inflation-aware money.
Michael Ashton
Co-Founder
Mr. Ashton is a pioneer in the U.S. inflation derivatives market. Prior to founding Enduring Investments, Mr. Ashton worked for several large investment banks (including Deutsche Bank, Bankers Trust, J.P. Morgan, Natixis, and Barclays Capital) as a relative value strategist and as an options and inflation trader. Since 2003, when he traded the first interbank U.S. CPI swaps, and 2004 when he invented and was the lead market maker for the CME's CPI Futures contract, he has played an integral role in developing new instruments and methods for accessing and hedging various inflation exposures.
Andrew Fately
Co-Founder / Managing Partner
Known as the FX Poet, Andrew is a veteran of more than 40 years in the foreign exchange markets, trading spot, forwards and options as well as running both sales and trading businesses for major US and international commercial and investment banks (including Chase Manhattan, Lehman Brothers, Barclays Capital and Royal Bank of Canada).
Roger Ramia
Co-Founder / Technical Lead
With a robust 25-year career in information technology, Roger Ramia has excelled across diverse roles ranging from hands-on software development and architecture to high-level executive management. His credentials include a BS in MIS from George Mason University and an MBA from Johns Hopkins University's Carey School of Business.
Vanessa Pestritto
Operating Partner, Electric Gems
Vanessa Pestritto focuses on ecosystem collaboration to advance the adoption of emerging technologies. She is the founder of Electric Gems, LLC, a venture that supports technology companies in developing growth strategies and go-to-market execution. Previously, she served as Director of Partner Programs at Agoric and Director of Strategic Growth at Ripple.
Frequently Asked Questions
How does USDi hold reserves?
When a USDi coin is minted, the money received is invested in the USDi Coin Fund, which invests in a portfolio managed by Enduring Investments designed to track monthly changes in the US Consumer Price Index. The portfolio holds, on an unlevered basis, a low-volatility mix of US Treasuries, inflation-linked bonds, foreign exchange, commodities futures and options, and cash — with a historical annualized volatility of just over 2%. For the three years ended December 2025, the portfolio had a correlation with monthly inflation of 58–86%. The objective is to keep USDi always fully backed by the assets of the USDi Coin Fund.
Who validates the value of the assets backing USDi?
The value of the USDi Coin Fund is calculated each time a USDi Coin is minted or burned, by a respected independent Administrator (Trident Fund Services Inc). Monthly, the official value as determined by Trident will be reported on this website. Annually, the USDi Coin Fund will be audited by Cherry Bekaert LLC, and the audit report posted on this website.
How do I buy or sell USDi?
USDi can be minted or burned through a public call to the blockchain via the USDicoin.com/coin page, and is available on Uniswap. Institutions and investors wishing to mint or burn large amounts (>$1mm USD value) can transact directly with USDi Partners after passing KYC and AML checks, exchanging fiat for USDi. We are working to increase liquidity pools and market-makers on exchanges so that buying and selling can take place on an exchange.
How does USDi's price change with inflation?
Inflation data are released monthly. USDi turns this into a daily inflation adjustment by interpolating between Not Seasonally Adjusted CPI values from three and two months ago to create a Reference CPI — the same mechanism used for TIPS bonds. The Reference CPI is compared to March 1, 2025 (315.605) to get the USDi value.
For example, a buyer on March 1, 2025 paid $1.000000; on April 1, 2025 the price was 317.671/315.605 = $1.00655 — a 0.655% rise matching inflation exactly.
Does USDi pay interest?
USDi does not pay any interest. The price increase over time is simply compensation for the loss of purchasing power of a dollar. Our accountants indicate this is treated as a capital gain rather than interest, though different taxing authorities may disagree — consult your own tax professional.
Because USDi is a coin, it may also be possible to earn an additional yield by depositing USDi into a participating liquidity pool.
How is USDi's inflation protection different from TIPS?
USDi and TIPS use the same mechanism to adjust principal value. However, TIPS are also exposed to market price fluctuations from interest rate changes — a 1% yield increase on a 10-year TIPS causes ~8.8% price decrease due to its ~9-year duration.
A USDi Coin has a 'maturity' every day. Consequently, in contrast to TIPS, a USDi Coin has no interest rate risk.
Will there be additional functionality in the future?
Once USDi has sufficient float and seasoning, functionality will be added to allow the coin to be split into sub-components that add up to the Consumer Price Index — approximately: 36% Rent of Shelter, 7% Energy, 14% Food, 1% College Tuition, 8% Medical Care, and 34% Other Core Goods and Services. Each sub-coin would trade separately and could be reassembled back into USDi.
Stay tuned for this development.