{
  "id": 5576035,
  "title": "Pencil Finance Completes $1 Million On-Chain Student Loan Cycle",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/04/pencil-finance-completes-1-million-on-chain-student-loan-cycle",
  "topic": "finance",
  "section": "Finance & Markets",
  "published": "2026-09-04T14:56:29.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Korea IT Times",
    "slug": "korea-it-times",
    "url": "https://www.koreaittimes.com/news/articleView.html?idxno=156821"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": null,
  "summary": "Pencil Finance, a real-world asset protocol focused on education financing, has completed a $1 million student loan cycle on-chain, marking the first of its kind to be fully completed through blockchain infrastructure. The financing, which took place on September 3, supported loans for over 6,600 students across 118 schools and universities in Southeast Asia, including the Philippines and Indonesia. The initiative, co-incubated by Animoca Brands and HackQuest, utilized EDU Chain, a blockchain network developed for education-related applications. Pencil Finance described the transaction as an early test of whether blockchain-based financing can connect global investors with education lenders and borrowers underserved by conventional financial institutions. The financing was divided into a senior tranche offering fixed returns and a junior tranche carrying variable returns and first-loss risk. Most of the capital was deployed through ErudiFi, an education financing provider that offers student loans and tuition funding in Southeast Asia.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}