Loan-to-value (LTV)

LTV is the ratio that keeps a crypto-backed loan honest. If you put up $1,000 of crypto and borrow $500 against it, your LTV is 50%. As you borrow more — or as your collateral’s price falls — the ratio climbs, and the higher it goes, the riskier the position.

Why it matters: any card that lets you spend without selling your crypto is lending you money against that crypto, and LTV is the dial that decides when the lender steps in. Cross a set threshold and your collateral gets liquidated — sold off to repay the loan. A market dip alone can push your LTV over the edge even if you never borrowed another cent, so the gap between your starting LTV and the liquidation line is your real safety margin.

For example: Nexo lends up to roughly 50% LTV against BTC and ETH (stablecoins go higher, many altcoins lower), and begins selling collateral if your LTV climbs to about 83.3%. So borrowing the full 50% leaves you a buffer of only a price drop or two before a margin call. ether.fi Cash sets its own per-asset thresholds in Borrow Mode — for example weETH at a 55% LTV cap and a 75% liquidation threshold. Both as of June 2026.