Neutrl has opened a redemption program that pays 0.51 USDC for each NUSD through an Ethereum contract, offering holders an exit at a 49% discount to the token’s $1 reference value.
The rate is visible onchain. In Neutrl’s redemption contract, the redemptionRate() function returns 510000000000000000, which equals 0.51 using 18 decimals. Neutrl said holders of NUSD and sNUSD can submit redemption requests, receive USDC, and have the corresponding tokens burned. Its public announcement, however, did not specify what conversion applies to sNUSD.
Strata’s junior protection is set to be exhausted
The same 0.51 NUSD valuation is also set to consume the first-loss buffer in Strata’s Neutrl market. Strata scheduled an update that, once executed, would write jrNUSD down to zero and set the srNUSD/NUSD value at 1.23971. Withdrawals would be settled in sNUSD at the revised share values, not directly in USDC.
OAK Research raised a legal concern over the redemption terms. The firm said users who accept the program may be required to waive recourse against Neutrl across all of their tokens, even if they redeem only part of their holdings. Neutrl’s public notice says users must sign an onchain message to verify wallet ownership and encourages them to review the applicable terms, but it does not describe that acknowledgment as a liability waiver. During The Defiant’s reporting, the portal was region-blocked, which prevented an independent review of the exact clause.
Liquid reserves cover about half of listed supply
The 51-cent redemption rate broadly matches the shortfall Neutrl disclosed after pausing the affected smart contracts. On Aug. 28, the protocol said it held about $27 million in available liquid assets, while additional strategy positions and their associated profit or loss were not liquid. At the time, Neutrl said it could not confirm the timing, amount, or recovery value of those positions.
The CoinGecko page reviewed by The Defiant showed 53.39 million NUSD in circulating supply. Based on those figures, Neutrl’s disclosed liquid assets equaled roughly 50.6% of the listed supply, closely tracking the contract’s 0.51 redemption ratio.
CoinGecko showed NUSD near $1, but also said the token had not traded in the previous 24 hours and that the displayed figure reflected its last recorded price.
Neutrl said the freeze stemmed from 「an issue affecting a position held within the strategy」. According to its Aug. 28 disclosure, the problem impaired the liquidity of part of its reserves and was not a smart contract exploit, hack, or code vulnerability.
Losses hit jrNUSD first
Strata’s srNUSD and jrNUSD tranches are both exposed to the sNUSD held by the strategy contract. Under the loss-allocation framework described by Strata, jrNUSD absorbs losses before srNUSD.
At a 0.51 NUSD reference value, Strata said the loss is larger than the junior protection layer. Its strategy contract held 1,569,767.937465 sNUSD against 1,347,230.397196 srNUSD outstanding. Once the scheduled update is executed, the contract calculations would allocate the entire sNUSD balance to senior holders and none to jrNUSD holders.
Strata also said the scheduled srNUSD/NUSD value of 1.23971 is an accounting value produced by the contract, not a guaranteed cash recovery. The protocol warned that contract-generated values may differ from the amounts holders can actually realize, and said withdrawals would settle in sNUSD.
Execution can happen no earlier than Sept. 19
Strata’s scheduling transaction was confirmed on Ethereum at 6:48 p.m. UTC on Sept. 17 with a 172,800-second delay. That means the update can execute no earlier than 2:48 p.m. ET on Sept. 19. Strata said withdrawals will open after execution, while deposits remain disabled.