S&P Global is bringing ratings-style risk assessments to crypto lending vaults as the fast-growing market confronts fresh security failures.

The ratings firm launched its Vault Risk Assessment framework on Oct. 4, creating a standardized approach for comparing the likelihood that investors suffer impairment in lending vaults. Deposits in the products reached about $10 billion in September, up from $1.5 billion two years earlier, according to S&P.

The launch came the same day blockchain security firm CertiK flagged suspicious movements involving an unnamed vault on Coinbase-backed Base network.

According to the blockchain security firm, the newly deployed proxy borrowed about 1,783 aBaswstETH, worth roughly $6 million, from the vault before redeeming the tokens through Aave for around 1,783 wstETH.

The incident did not exploit Aave itself. Instead, it highlighted a problem that grows more relevant as vaults become more popular: investors can be exposed to risks introduced by the contracts, permissions, and managers between their deposits and the underlying lending protocols.

That distinction sits at the heart of S&P's new framework. Vaults pool investor assets and allocate them according to predefined strategies, with those decisions either automated through smart contracts or overseen by human managers known as curators. Investors receive tokens representing claims on the pooled assets and returns.

S&P's framework evaluates six areas: portfolio credit quality, liquidity mismatch, curator risk, blockchain risk, protocol risk, and vault security and governance.

The assessment is designed to move beyond the point-in-time transparency provided by blockchain transactions and examine how a vault could behave as conditions change.

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