The conversion between Hive and HBD is the original way to go from one to the other, and it is part of the layer 1 blockchain protocol and code. We had it on the pre-fork chain as well. I think the HIVE is created/destroyed when converted to/from, if I recall correctly.
But now we can trade/swap on hive-engine which most people know about, but also https://beeswap.dcity.io/convert which less know about. The later offers rewards rather than fees sometimes for doing a swap, so not only do you satisfy your need to swap but you make money from it.
There is a well funded proposal which gets paid hundreds of HBD per day and its purpose is to stabilize the HBD price. It does this very well! And often makes a profit in the process. @smooth/hbd-stabilizer-proposal-august-2025
The APR on HBD has been 15% for a while now, but was 20% for quite a while too. When people vote for witnesses who signal a higher HBD then the rate can go back up. The rate is the median value of the top 21 witnesses, if I recall correctly.
HBD competes against other stable coins, such as $SURGE in the LEO-verse, paying about 18% now. Also against banks paying up to 4.3% (Everbank for example https://www.everbank.com/) and government bonds and bills (around 4%) and Stock funds like SGOV (around https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/SGOV/) and now Strategy's Bitcoin backed stock paying about 9% https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/strategy-s-capital-pyramid-is-stretch-the-smartest-or-riskiest-layer-yet/ar-AA1K9AQZ
One can see that we pay among the highest returns. All you have to do is trust the HIVE blockchain. :)
Best wishes in all you do!
RE: Money (aka HBD)