Infrastructure Challenges and the SEP-40 Standard Solution

This growth in tokenized financial instruments comes with technical challenges that go beyond simple blockchain issuance. Decentralized finance platforms require standardized mechanisms to set prices, grant backed loans, and execute liquidations efficiently.
The cross-contract call model of the Soroban environment on Stellar causes oracle integrations that do not follow a common standard to increase gas costs and technical complexity. To tackle this problem, the SEP-40 standard features a unified interface that determines how the network’s apps consume price data, independently of the provider used.
The protocol has technical specifications according to which the SEP-40-based implementation allows smart contracts to request information through last price, multi-record, or point-in-time price calls. The design includes detailed timestamps on each data record, making it easier for protocols to verify the validity of the information before processing financial transactions.
Risk Management and Valuation of Financial Collateral
The use of tokenized private credit as collateral in DeFi operations presents valuation dynamics substantially different from those of native crypto assets like ETH. While traditional liquid assets trade continuously on multiple global platforms, the value of private fixed-income or credit instruments depends on the underlying credit quality and the issuer’s redemption conditions.
According to the consulted source, a data feed based solely on the previous day’s net asset value (NAV) might not accurately reflect current credit risk during times of market volatility.
To meet this operational need, the data infrastructure provides high-frequency collateral valuations through a standardized architecture. The integration of these data feeds into the ecosystem aims to transform issued assets into liquid, usable financial tools for institutional capital.
At the close of the first half of 2026, the implementation of the SEP-40 standard features active data feeds for nine key assets on Stellar, ranging from stablecoins and sovereign debt securities to Bitcoin-linked products. The consolidation of this data layer stands as the infrastructure component designed to support liquidity and functionality in the real-world asset markets within the network.