Welcome to DeFi Pulse Farmer – your guide to staying up on the latest and best trends in yield farming and beyond.
In this newsletter, we break down top stories, developments, and trends from the past week in tandem with two key farming opportunities to keep an eye on.
If you want to access the full DeFi Pulse Farmer experience to receive emerging Yield Farming opportunities sent to you throughout the week as part of our Alpha Tractor Series, or the DeFi Pulse Farmer Protocol Express, which consists of a weekly recap of APYs and new pools on major protocols and a highlight of an emerging opportunity, subscribe today.
Since the publication of this column last weekend DeFi’s total value locked (TVL) surged $10B, climbing from ~$59B to +$69B in that span. Up only this week, eh? Works for us, thank you very much!
Yet just like last week when we saw positive price action in spite of serious regulation news (SEC Chairman Gary Gensler targeting DeFi synths, remember?), we have a similar dynamic at work now.
The current buzzkill (which is still in play, so don’t freak out totally just yet) comes from the USA again, where legislators have crammed in anti-crypto language to a widely-backed, bipartisan infrastructure bill (for building roads, etc.) that if passed, could scare crypto enterprises out of America.
So what are we actually talking about here? No one’s broken it down better than Jake Chervinsky, the General Counsel for Compound Finance, who outlined the drama in an excellent Twitter thread this week.
To summarize, the U.S. Congress has jammed in anti-crypto rules to a widely popular infrastructure bill that, at least right now, has good chances of passing. The language of this crypto section is so broad that it would make almost all DeFi actors have to adhere to onerous, i.e. impossible, user reporting rules.
If this bill passes then DeFi activity in the U.S. could begin to suffocate. That could be temporarily devastating for the wider DeFi ecosystem, so if you live in the United States of America then calling up your local and regional legislators and slamming this legislation isn’t a bad idea!
That’s the big picture, but let’s step back as always and review how the top DeFi tokens have been doing lately. We’ve seen strong 7-day runs from FARM (+215%), RUNE (+62%), PERP (+60%), REP (+53%), and HEGIC (+43%). The DeFi Pulse Index (DPI) is up 22% to $315.24 in the same span!
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Farm 2-3 digit APYs on blue-chip DeFi farms via Visor
So most everyone in DeFi at this point knows the relatively new Uniswap V3 system is really powerful. On the flip side and because of added complexities, many folks still have no idea how to set up or actively manage Uniswap V3 liquidity provider (LP) positions sensibly.
That’s a pretty big problem, right?!
Well don’t fret, the good news is you don’t have to go study for dozens of hours to really figure out how to effectively wrangle Uniswap V3. Instead, you can just use a protocol like Visor Finance, which effectively automates the management of Uniswap V3 LP positions so you can just sit back and relax after depositing your initial funds.
Here, it’s important to keep in mind that Visor’s Uniswap V3 farms are still in beta, so there are deposit caps in place that may keep you from aping in all at once right now. That said, these DeFi pastures have proven fertile so far so we encourage you to keep an eye out going forward, as the deposit caps won’t be there forever.
As for actually joining Visor’s ongoing farms, have the requisite funds prepared and then head over to the project’s Vault dashboard, mint your Visor NFT, pick the vault or vaults that’s right for you and complete the ensuing deposit instructions. You even have the option to provide single asset liquidity.
Once that’s finished you’ll receive an NFT representing your Visor positions, which itself is representing Uniswap V3 LP NFT positions. How’s that for meta-finance?!
Visor Finance is a compelling project worth any DeFiers curiosity, but at the same time the protocol has also been exploited before for a non-trivial sum of money. You know what that means? You have to use caution! It’d be silly to disregard Visor over one incident, but at the same time you also have to protect yourself. That’s why it’s crucial to not to invest more money into Visor than you can afford to lose!
Keep an eye on the upcoming release by our partner dHEDGE👀
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XTK Staking Is Live
TLDR: “Set and forget” DeFi investments project xToken rolls out its XTK staking system and a 3-month XTK staking incentives program. -
Integral Launches Million Dollar Trading Challenge
TLDR: AMM project Integral unveils a $1M trading challenge that allows Integral traders to earn ITGR rewards from a prize pool of 100k ITGR. -
Thales dapp launches on Ethereum mainnet
TLDR: Thales, an on-chain binary options protocol built atop Synthetix, deploys on Ethereum. -
Synth Exchanges Are Live on L2
TLDR: Decentralized derivatives project Synthetix announces its synths can now be traded via Kwenta on the Optimistic Ξthereum layer-two scaling solution. -
The Blue Pill
TLDR: Upon Yearn’s 1st birthday, the project releases a series of commemorative NFTs that include access to a book that covers Yearn’s origins and roadmap. -
TWAMM
TLDR: Paradigm + Uniswap’s Hayden Adams introduce TWAMM, a new type of AMM specialized for efficiently executing large order sizes. -
NFTs are live on Zerion
TLDR: Zerion announces support for NFTs across all of the DeFi wallet dashboard’s apps.
Farm WETH at 17% and/or Tricrypto at 37% APY
Earlier this month the Harvest team launched their next evolution, Harvest Finance V2. The optimized system is all about providing “cutting-edge yield farming opportunities while making it easier and accessible for any type of user,” so does it deliver?
From what we’ve seen so far, we’d say definitely. Ultimately we’re all looking for solid places to safely park our funds for productive returns, and Harvest Finance currently meets that bar.
Specifically, this week we’re looking at Harvest’s WETH and Tricrypto pools because the risk/return profiles look strong, at least presently speaking. So if you’re keen on joining either of these farms, you’ll need to acquire some WETH/crvTriCrypto tokens first.
Once that’s done, you can head over to Harvest’s Farms page and select your farm of choice. Follow through with the deposit, and you’ll be farming in relatively safe fashion!
Just because Harvest Finance seems relatively safe doesn’t mean you should go aping in with the last of your stablecoin reserves. Explore the protocol, research it, and if you’re still interested start out with a small, experimental deposit. Only once you’re comfortable with Harvest should you consider depositing large amounts, and never do so with money you can’t afford to lose just to be safe!
This Saturday’s plow of the week goes to the Synthetix Telegram Bot! A tool that saves farmers the hassle of constantly checking their c-ratio. Check it out👇
Lick the tip of your finger and put it in the air. Feel that? It’s the winds of change a’blowin’. And those winds are currently sweeping over your DeFi crops, bringing fresh gusts of hope and optimism.
We do have a lot of work and a lot of challenges ahead of us in the ecosystem, there’s no getting around that. But in the meantime, we’ll do our best, farm what we can, and smile a little easier at the world around us. Why? We’re toiling toward a better future, both for ourselves and for people in general, and that matters 👊
All info in this newsletter is purely educational and should only be used to inform your own research. We’re not offering investment advice, endorsement of any project or approach, or promise of any outcome. This is prepared using public information and couldn’t possibly account for anyone’s specific goals or financial situation. Be careful and keep up the honest work!