This Week In DeFi – February 19

To the DeFi community,

What would this be without a mention of Binance Smart Chain. While this is “DeFi Rate”, we must pay respect to the market, and the market has shown interest in the cuddly new products soaking up TVL on the brainchild of CZ. Pancakeswap surpassed Uniswap volume, largely due to $0.20 transaction fees and near real-time settlement, many degens are flocking to the latest yields with a feeling reminiscent of the earliest days of DeFi.

However, it’s not all about BSC. Pool Together showcased their POOL token with a retroactive airdrop – allowing users to earn rewards for participating in the no-loss lottery that takes DeFi composability to exciting new use cases. 1inch surprised it’s users with a second retroactive airdrop too. Not too shabby!

The POOL distribution to depositors has started.

Any wallet holding a deposit in a governance managed prize pool is now automatically receiving POOL. Viewable on your account page: https://t.co/tNYti1fidk

— PoolTogether (@PoolTogether_) February 18, 2021

 

As everyone has surely seen, NFT marketplace volume spiked as collectors and trading volume more than tripled since last week. Names like Nifty Gateway, SuperRare, Foundation, Zora, Rarible and OpenSea are quickly becoming household names as anyone and everyone scrambles to get their hands on scarce digital collectibles.

1/ I’m getting TONS of messages me asking me “Hey DC, what #NFTs should I buy?

The proper answer is ONLY ones that you enjoy and are willing to hold for years or possibly for forever.

But I will tell you some of the ones I have bought recently and why (MEGA-thread below)👇

— DCinvestor | Aftab (@iamDCinvestor) February 14, 2021

 

Syntehtix raised $12 million in a funding round led by Paradigm and Coinbase Ventures through a direct purchase of SNX tokens from the SynthetixDAO. The venture firms plan to be involved in governance and to provide SNX as liquidity collateral. Paradigm has made several direct DeFi token investments, and is praised by many as being the most hands-on investment fund in the space.

1/

I think it’s worth briefly explaining the positive and mutually beneficial experience I’ve had working with @paradigm @a16z @usv and other investors.

I’ve seen a lot of negativity and propaganda so I think it’s worth sharing my personal experience.

Quick thread:

— Hayden Adams 🦄 (@haydenzadams) February 12, 2021

 

Speaking of Uniswap, the leading decentralized exchange passed $100 billion in trading volume this week, a milestone that would have seemed almost impossible less than a year ago. In fact, overall DEX volume for 2021 has already surpassed $100 billion and we’re not even into March yet. Could we see $1 trillion by the end of the year? At the rate the industry is growing, doesn’t seem all that impossible… Stay tuned.

New primitives keep coming with the mainnet launch of RAI from Reflexer Labs, an asset designed to be stable without being pegged to a specific currency. RAI has seen years of development and months of testing, and should offer another alternative to algorithmic and elastic-supply assets for retaining value during down markets.

1/n RAI is (officially) live!

Let the money god rise and shine 🗿https://t.co/anKCFHhJAd

— Reflexer Labs (@reflexerfinance) February 17, 2021

 

Almost a year into DeFi’s meteoric rise and with the NFT market taking off, there’s no denying that some of the lowest hanging fruit in the crypto market has been picked. But as protocols like Pool Together and new assets like RAI show, innovation and fair distributions are becoming the norm, not the exception, and there’s loads of opportunity still just waiting to be discovered for those willing to go looking for it.

In fact, with so many competing projects in different crypto market segments, the biggest challenge might just be keeping up with everything that’s going on. Whatever you do, don’t forget that everyone’s a genius in a bull market!

Highest Yields: dYdX at 14.25% APY, Fulcrum at 12.75% APY

Cheapest Loans: CoinList at 3.00% APY, Aave at 7.07% APY

MakerDAO Updates

DAI Savings Rate: 0.00%

Base Fee: 0.00%

ETH Stability Fee: 4.50%

USDC Stability Fee: 0.00%

WBTC Stability Fee: 4.50%

Highest Yields: dYdX at 47.29% APY,  Fulcrum at 15.06% APY

Cheapest Loans: CoinList at 1% APY, Aave at 7.57% APY

Pool Together rewards participants with another governance token airdrop.

RAI aims to bring a new stable asset to the crypto industry, peg-free.

1inch airdrops more governance tokens for traders in 2021.

Traditional investors have a new way to get in on the DeFi craze.

InsureDAO launches p2p insurance for a more robust DEFi ecosystem.

Total Value Locked: $42.05B (up 2.41% since last week)

DeFi Market Cap: $85.11B (up 2.58%)

DEX Weekly Volume: $13.35B (down -7.87%)

DAI Supply: 2.34B (up 14.7%)

Total DeFi Users: 1,449,000 (up 4.55%)

[Dan Kahn – The Defiant] – $SOCKS is Now Worth $85k. That’s it. That’s the Headline.

[Cooper Turley – The Defiant] NFT Sales Boom in the Last 30 Days

[Justin Blau – The Defiant] – Building the Investable Layer of Music, by 3LAU

[Cooper Turley – Mirror] VALUE – My First NFT Crowdsale 

[David Hoffman and Lucas Campbell – Bankless] – How a DeFi power user got hacked for $24M

[The Defiant] – The Road to Uniswap’s $100B

[Anthony Sassano – The Daily Gwei] – Whales Are Accumulating – The Daily Gwei #186