# Yield-Bearing Vaults (ERC-4626) ## What is a yield-bearing Vault? Vaults are comprised of smart contracts that help DeFi users find the best yield on their crypto tokens through the execution of different strategies that are designed to generate a return through capital movements, auto compounding, and rebalancing. Once tokens are deposited into the Vault, yield-bearing tokens are issued to represent the deposited share of the pool. ## About ERC-4626 "ERC-4626: Tokenized Vault Standard" is an Ethereum application developer interface for building token vaults and strategies. It is meant to consolidate and standardize development efforts around “ERC-20 token strategies” such as borrow & lending, farming and staking. Benefits of using this standard include: * Improved interoperability of different protocols to ensure an easier experience implementing new yield Vaults into applications by using a single API * Standardizing code helps mitigate poorly written smart contracts * Access to maximum yield strategies as more and more Vaults are introduced with less developmental overhead Ionic's goal is to help facilitate as many yield-bearing strategies for our users to maximize their investment. Utilizing many popular and top protocols in the space, Ionic aims to create easy-to-use functionality in order to achieve this. Full details about the ERC are available in the official spec: --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://docs.ionic.money/yield-bearing-vaults-erc-4626.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.