Givvest

About Givvest

Giving without giving anything away

Givvest lets anyone donate to charity using only the interest their money earns — not the money itself. Your principal stays yours. Always.

The problem with traditional giving

Most people want to give to charity. But money is finite, life is unpredictable, and parting with cash permanently carries real risk. What if you need it next month? What if your circumstances change?

These aren’t excuses. They’re rational concerns. The result is that billions of dollars in potential charity never gets donated — not because people don’t care, but because giving forever feels irreversible.

What if giving didn’t cost you anything?

Givvest is built around one insight: when money sits idle, it can still work. Banks, investment accounts, and digital finance protocols all earn interest on deposits. Usually, that interest flows back to the institution or the depositor.

Givvest redirects it to charity instead.

You deposit digital dollars (USDC — a 1:1 dollar-backed digital currency). Those dollars earn interest through Aave, a well-established lending protocol. The interest goes to charity. Your original deposit comes back to you whenever you ask for it.

A simple example

01

You deposit $1,000 into Givvest.

02

Your $1,000 earns, say, 5% interest per year — $50.

03

That $50 goes to a charity voted on by the Givvest community.

04

After a year, you withdraw your $1,000 back in full.

05

You have lost nothing. A charity received $50.

The interest rate varies with market conditions and is never guaranteed. Your deposit, however, is always fully returned.

What is USDC?

USDC is a digital dollar. Each USDC token is backed 1:1 by real US dollars held in regulated financial institutions. It doesn’t fluctuate in value the way Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies do. $1 of USDC is always worth approximately $1.

It’s the type of digital asset most people use when they want the benefits of blockchain technology — transparency, speed, low fees — without exposure to price swings.

How does the interest get generated?

Givvest uses Aave — one of the largest and most battle-tested lending protocols in digital finance. Think of Aave as a transparent, automated lending bank that publishes every transaction publicly.

When you deposit USDC through Givvest, it gets lent to borrowers who post collateral. Borrowers pay interest. That interest is what gets donated to charity.

Aave has operated securely since 2020, managing billions of dollars in deposits. It is not infallible — no financial system is — but it represents the current standard for this type of activity in digital finance.

Honest about the risks

We want to be straight with you. Givvest is built on technology that is newer than traditional banking. There are risks:

  • —Variable yield: The interest rate Aave pays fluctuates with market demand. Your donation amount will vary month to month — sometimes higher, sometimes lower.
  • —Keep your wallet safe: Givvest is non-custodial — only you control your funds. Use a hardware wallet or a trusted software wallet, and never share your seed phrase.

Only deposit what you’re comfortable exposing to these risks. Givvest is not a bank and deposits are not insured by government schemes.

Who decides which charities receive the donations?

The Givvest team currently controls the allocation of harvested yield to charities. Every distribution is made on-chain — meaning anyone can verify that funds went where we said they went.

We plan to transition to DAO governance over time, opening allocation decisions to the Givvest community.

At no point can governance access your principal. Governance can only direct the interest — the surplus above what depositors are owed — to charity recipients.

Built on Base

Givvest runs on Base, a blockchain built by Coinbase. Base is fast, inexpensive to use, and environmentally efficient compared to older blockchain technology. Transactions typically cost a few cents and settle in seconds.

Base also inherits the security properties of Ethereum, the most battle-tested smart-contract platform in existence.

Smart Contracts

Ready to start generating donations without giving anything away?

Givvest Now