Ethena Labs is teaming up with the Safe Foundation in a move aimed at making its synthetic dollar, USDe, easier and more attractive to hold on Ethereum. The partnership focuses on two practical upgrades: eliminating gas fees for USDe transactions on Ethereum’s mainnet and significantly increasing rewards for users who store USDe in Safe’s self-custodial wallets.
Announced on Tuesday, the collaboration is designed to accelerate adoption of USDe, one of the largest onchain tokenized dollars, by reducing friction for both individual users and crypto-native organizations. Under the new arrangement, USDe holders using Safe multisig wallets will benefit from gas-free transactions and a tenfold boost in points earned through Ethena’s current rewards program.
Both teams framed the partnership as part of a broader push toward self-custody in the stablecoin economy. In a joint statement, the companies said the initiative reflects their shared goal of positioning Safe’s wallet ecosystem as a primary gateway to Ethena’s products while keeping assets fully onchain and under user control.
Safe has become a widely used tool for decentralized autonomous organizations, Web3 startups, and other crypto-focused enterprises that need secure, programmable wallet infrastructure. Originating from research and development work at Gnosis, Safe’s smart contract wallets are non-custodial and designed to handle complex treasury and governance needs.
That existing user base already holds a substantial amount of stable assets. Roughly $6.6 billion in stablecoins are currently secured in Safe multisig wallets. Of that total, about $65.1 million is held in sUSDe, the yield-bearing, staked version of Ethena’s synthetic dollar. According to Dune analytics, these holdings represent close to 85% of all Ethena assets stored in Safe wallets.
With the new incentive structure, Safe accounts holding USDe will receive a 10x multiplier on points accumulated during Ethena’s ongoing rewards campaign. Ethena Labs founder Guy Young said the partnership is expected to deepen USDe’s role across decentralized finance, helping it reach “the deepest layers of the DeFi economy.”
USDe itself stands apart from traditional fiat-backed stablecoins. Built primarily on Ethereum, it maintains its one-dollar peg without relying on bank reserves. Instead, Ethena uses a delta-neutral strategy that combines long positions in crypto assets such as ether with hedged short positions in perpetual futures. This structure aims to offset price volatility while generating yield from funding rates and basis spreads.
Although Ethena often avoids calling USDe a stablecoin, it is commonly grouped alongside assets like USDT and USDC because of its focus on price stability. Recently, USDe slipped to fourth place among onchain dollars after being overtaken by Sky’s USDS, according to industry data.
Beyond USDe, Ethena Labs has been expanding its broader product lineup, including a white-glove stablecoin-as-a-service offering. That service has already attracted interest, most notably from Solana-based trading platform Jupiter.
