Every machine needs a financing layer.

The yield comes from the operating margin of physical businesses. A laundromat that generates $50,000 in annual revenue on $100,000 of deployed equipment yields 50% gross. After DualMint's fees, the liquidity buffer, and diversification across asset types, 10–15% net is the conservative estimate. It doesn't fall when rates fall because it has nothing to do with rates.

In 13 months, zero operators have defaulted. If one does, the asset moves to a pre-vetted backup and the machine keeps running. Seven layers sit between an operator failure and vault capital. The first is the operator's own money, posted at onboarding before anything goes wrong.

IoT telemetry is cross-referenced against operator revenue reports and independently reviewed each quarter. Every distribution is verifiable onchain. The vault isn't live yet — smart contract audits go out before it is. That's the honest answer.

$500. The vault is built for fractional access — you don't need an institutional ticket size and you don't need a savings-account-size allocation. The Machine Yield Index isn't live yet; this is the minimum at launch.

The legal structure is a BVI SPV, bankruptcy-remote. DualMint's corporate fate doesn't determine what happens to the assets. The machines exist independently. Operators run them. Revenue continues without DualMint. The infrastructure routes cash flow onchain — the machines generate it.

Redemptions settle within 30 days. The vault keeps 20–70% of TVL liquid in early stages to handle normal withdrawals without selling assets. The 30-day window isn't a platform limitation. It's just how long it takes to move capital out of something physical.

Operating machines generate cash flow every day. IoT captures each transaction and cross-references it against bank deposits. What's left after fees distributes to depositors in USDC each month.

DeFi yield comes from token emissions, lending spreads, or protocol fees, and all of it moves with the market. DualMint yield comes from machines running physical cycles. The deeper difference is failure mode: DeFi collateral reprices on sentiment with no warning, while operational collateral fails through utilisation, which IoT telemetry shows months before it hits cash flow. A default is a write-down. A shortfall is a repair.

A rate cut does not reduce laundry cycles. People do the same laundry in a recession as they do in a bull market. HVAC contracts run on building operations, not consumer sentiment. The machines don't have a view on monetary policy. That's why the yield doesn't compress when treasury rates fall and doesn't fall when crypto sells off.

AI can't eat a washing machine. Content agencies, SaaS margins, and some DeFi yield strategies are being displaced. The physical economy isn't on that list — a laundromat can't be prompted, an HVAC contract can't be fine-tuned. "Boring business" searches hit a 5-year global high in 2026. Capital is already moving toward the thing AI can't reach.