> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://hevninc.mintlify.site/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# What is HEVN

> HEVN is a non-custodial financial platform: your money lives in a smart wallet only you own, while HEVN provides the banking-grade tooling around it.

HEVN is a financial platform for global payments built on USDC. It gives individuals and businesses the tools of a modern bank — invoices, contacts, contracts, bank payouts, cards, and statements — without ever taking custody of their money.

Every HEVN account is a [Base Smart Wallet](https://docs.base.org/base-account/overview/what-is-base-account) on the Base network, owned exclusively by a key that only the user controls. HEVN the platform stores metadata (contacts, invoices, bank details) and orchestrates workflows, but it **cannot move, freeze, or access user funds**.

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Architecture" icon="layers" href="/general/architecture">
    How email, Privy, and Base smart wallets fit together.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Key management with Privy" icon="key-round" href="/general/privy-wallets">
    Self-custodial keys secured by Shamir sharding and TEEs.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Base smart wallets" icon="wallet" href="/general/smart-wallets">
    Gasless USDC, deterministic addresses, and onchain ownership.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Security model" icon="shield-check" href="/general/security-model">
    What HEVN can and cannot do with your money.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>

## Core principles

### Non-custodial by construction

HEVN is not a wallet provider holding funds on your behalf. Your balance is USDC sitting in a smart contract wallet on Base. The only key that can authorize spending from that wallet is your [Privy embedded wallet](https://docs.privy.io/wallets/overview/embedded) — a key that is cryptographically sharded and never visible to HEVN or to Privy itself.

There is no HEVN omnibus account, no pooled balance, and no internal ledger that "represents" your money. The onchain balance **is** the balance.

### Deterministic identity

Your entire account chain is derived deterministically:

```mermaid theme={null}
flowchart LR
    A["Email"] --> B["Privy embedded wallet"]
    B -->|"initial owner"| C["Base Smart Wallet<br/>(your HEVN account)"]
```

Because each step is deterministic, HEVN can compute the wallet address for any email address **before** the recipient ever signs up. This is what makes sending money by email safe: funds go directly to a smart wallet that only the owner of that email will ever be able to control. There is no escrow step and no custodial holding period.

### HEVN is never in the money flow

* **Deposits** (bank transfers, card top-ups, crypto) settle directly to your smart wallet address.
* **Payouts** to bank accounts are executed by a licensed banking partner: the partner issues a one-time deposit address, and *you* send the funds from your wallet. HEVN never receives, forwards, or holds the money.
* **Cross-chain deposits and withdrawals** use the [NEAR Intents 1Click API](https://docs.near-intents.org/integration/distribution-channels/1click-api/about-1click-api) with one-time passive deposit addresses that HEVN does not control.

## What the platform layer does

The HEVN API (and the JWT it issues) covers everything that is *not* money movement:

* Contact book, invoicing, and contract management
* Bank details (virtual IBANs / account numbers) issuance
* KYC/KYB, statements, analytics
* Team and multi-user access administration

Authorization to actually **spend** funds always happens at the wallet layer, with a signature from your key. See [Authentication](/general/authentication) for the split between platform auth and money auth.

## Interfaces

| Surface  | What it is                                                    | Docs                                     |
| -------- | ------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------- |
| Web app  | Full product UI at [app.gethevn.com](https://app.gethevn.com) | —                                        |
| CLI      | Scriptable access for operators and AI agents                 | [CLI tab](/cli/overview)                 |
| REST API | The same backend API the app and CLI use                      | [REST API tab](/api-reference/overview)  |
| MCP      | Model Context Protocol server for AI agents                   | [Connect AI agents](/cli/connect-agents) |