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Liquidity & Pools

Ratio’s liquidity model uses dedicated single-sided stablecoin pools. Each supported currency has its own pool — there are no paired AMM pools, no bonding curves, and no impermanent loss. This design gives you predictable, deep liquidity without the execution degradation that paired AMM pools produce at institutional transaction sizes.

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Single-sided pool design

Single-Sided Pools Unlike AMM protocols that require you to deposit two tokens together (e.g., a USDT/IDRX pool where both must be deposited and rebalanced), Ratio’s pools hold exactly one stablecoin each. When you swap USDT for IDRX, the USDT pool receives the inflow and the IDRX pool sends the outflow. Each pool is managed and monitored independently. This architecture provides three key advantages for your integration:
  • No impermanent loss for LPs — Liquidity providers deposit a single asset and receive that same asset back. There is no forced rebalancing between paired tokens that erodes LP returns, which means deeper, more stable liquidity.
  • Independent depth management — Each pool’s balance, utilisation, and health are tracked separately. A drain on the IDRX pool does not affect the USDT pool or any other corridor.
  • Clean inventory tracking — Per-pool design enables precise monitoring and targeted rebalancing, which feeds directly into the inventory spread component to keep pricing accurate.

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Supported pools

Phase 1 supports four stablecoin pools:
Pools are per-currency, not per-corridor. The USDT pool serves the USDT-IDRX, USDT-IDRP, and USDT-JPYC corridors. The IDRX pool serves the USDT-IDRX and IDRX-JPYC corridors. When you query pool depth for a corridor, the available liquidity is shared across all corridors that draw from the same pool.

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How liquidity providers fund pools

Liquidity comes from Liquidity Providers (LPs) who deposit stablecoins into Ratio’s pools. LPs include stablecoin issuers (such as the IDRX issuer), professional market makers, OTC desks, and institutional partners with stablecoin treasury. When an LP deposits into a pool, they receive kTokens in return — for example, kIDRX-fx for a Class A deposit into the IDRX pool. kTokens are share tokens that represent the LP’s proportional share of the pool. Swap fees accrue separately on-chain and are paid to LPs in USDT when claimed.

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The Liquidity Hub

The Liquidity Hub is the coordination layer that manages pool health across all corridors. It monitors pool balances, utilisation rates, and inventory skew in real time, and coordinates rebalancing activity when imbalances develop. FX flows naturally create imbalances. If many swaps go USDT→IDRX in a short period, the USDT pool grows while the IDRX pool shrinks. Left unchecked, this would deplete one side and make that corridor unavailable. The Liquidity Hub prevents this through three mechanisms:
  1. Inventory-aware pricing — The inventory skew component of the spread makes the flow direction that reduces imbalance cheaper, and the direction that worsens it more expensive. This naturally attracts offsetting flow without manual action.
  2. Automated rebalancing — When imbalances exceed configurable thresholds, the Liquidity Hub coordinates external rebalancing via market makers and OTC partners to restore target pool levels.
  3. Yield recycling — Idle liquidity that is not needed for active FX execution is deployed into yield strategies. When demand increases, that liquidity is recalled automatically to meet execution needs.

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What this means for your integration

Pool depth determines maximum transaction size. Each corridor has a maximum transaction size based on current pool depth and utilisation. You can query available depth before submitting a quote request. If your transaction exceeds available depth, you will receive an error rather than a degraded rate. Spreads reflect pool health. When a pool becomes imbalanced, the inventory spread component widens to encourage rebalancing flow. If you are regularly transacting in one direction and seeing wider-than-usual spreads, this is the inventory mechanism signalling that the pool needs rebalancing in the opposite direction.
If your use case involves high-volume one-directional flow, speak to your Ratio account manager about dedicated liquidity arrangements. Anchor LPs who provide liquidity to underserved pools receive preferential fee treatment.

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Yield Engine

Idle pool balances — liquidity that is not immediately needed for FX execution — are deployed into secure yield strategies through the Yield Engine. This improves the capital efficiency of the pools, which in turn makes LP participation more attractive and helps maintain deep, stable liquidity over time. For partners with stablecoin treasury balances, the Yield Engine is also available as a standalone service: deploy idle balances into yield strategies and recall them on demand. Contact your account manager to discuss treasury yield access during onboarding.