On the surface, Telcoin is another red-hot cryptocurrency that, along with Ethereum and Doge, rocketed to a new all-time high on Monday.

But there was no celebratory meme or juvenile jubilation shared by Telcoin executives across social media touting the price of the $TEL token.

Telcoin, supporters say, is a different breed of crypto — one that doesn’t resemble crypto in many tangible ways.

Offering remittance services targeting unbanked people across North America, South America, Asia, Africa, and Europe, Telcoin contends that it’s laying the foundation for new financial products within a compliant framework that meshes with the regulatory landscape of the various countries in which they will operate.

Despite being the talk of crypto fintech in 2021, if you only followed Telcoin’s official Twitter page, you likely wouldn’t know it. There are no hints of the raucous hoopla drummed up by ecstatic Telcoin holders who feel vindicated for the success Telcoin is finally experiencing after the company’s 2018 market debut.

Telcoin backers, or “Telfam,” as they’re colloquially called on social media, resemble your stereotypical coin cheerleaders who repetitiously but sincerely herald the merits of their preferred token. For Telcoin, its growing community of supporters is the only thing that looks like anything typical of contemporary crypto.

For the last three years, Telcoin has been working nose to the grind-stone to build a “compliance first” company with fintech solutions to match.

On Monday, Telcoin simultaneously reached a new highwater price mark while also breaking into the “Top 100” list on CoinMarketCap, essentially minting Telcoin’s status among elite cryptos in a field teeming with 9,000 cryptocurrencies.

“They’re not a pump coin, they’re a build-and-deliver coin,” one Telcoin holder Tweeted Monday. “Just wait until the end of Q2,” another added.

The end of Q2 is the release timeframe of Telcoin’s new cryptocurrency wallet that the company will introduce along with a suite of DeFi services that portend favorably for the company’s continue growth and otherwise shunned celebrity status.

In April, Telcoin offered an official update on the status of V3, which will enable users to purchase Telcoin and hold ERC-20 tokens within the app, as well as swap or stake coins for liquidity rewards.

“Telcoin V3 is the culmination of three years of research and development, organization building, and business development,” Telcoin said at the time. “The next generation of the Telcoin Platform stack is architected to fully harness the power of DeFi and the reach of telecoms to bring fast and affordable, user-owned financial products to every mobile network subscriber in the world.”

According to Telcoin, V3 introduces “two formative, compliant, user-owned financial products designed to operate at a fraction of the cost of traditional services, which execute automatically via smart contracts rather than intermediaries — and where active Telcoin users capture fees typically awarded exclusively to financial institutions.”

At a time when crypto companies are coveting attention any way they can get it, Telcoin is getting attention for not seeking it. They’re just content to just keep working.

And delivering.

“They’re letting the work speak for itself for now,” one Telcoin supporter offered on Twitter. “When V3 comes, I can imagine they’ll wanna brag as much as we’re already doing.”

Bitcoin, the world’s flagship crypto is raging up at a speed not seen in the crypto-verse.

At the time of writing this report, Bitcoin broke near $34,059 some minutes ago, according to data retrieved from the Bitstamp exchange.

READ: $350 million worth of Bitcoin moved by a large entity as it nears $30,000

READ: Why intelligent investors are secretly buying Bitcoin

READ: Bitcoin could hit above $100,000 by August 2021

More details shortly…

Olumide Adesina is a France-born Nigerian.He is a Certified Investment Trader, with more than 15 years of working expertise in Investment trading. Follow Olumide on Twitter @tokunboadesina or email [email protected]He is a Member of the Chartered Financial Analyst Society.

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A professor at NYU has argued in favor of Ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, saying that it has a better chance of becoming a commodity than bitcoin. 

Speaking to CNBC on Thursday (May 20, 2021), Aswath Damodaran, a professor of finance at New York University’s (NYU) Stern School of Business, said that ether showed better potential compared to bitcoin. Damodaran added that the ether was a better lubricant in a case where the future relied on blockchain transactions.

Most of the popular decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols are built on the Ethereum blockchain network. The DeFi space made headlines most of 2020 and has continued to see tremendous growth. Earlier in May, Uniswap, the largest Ethereum-based DeFi protocol, flipped bitcoin in terms of daily fees.

The NYU Professor, who is also known as the “dean of valuation” on Wall Street, has been a long-time bitcoin critic. Damodaran did not fail to comment on bitcoin’s volatility, calling it a “purely speculative game”. According Damodaran:

“All that bitcoin bulls seem to talk about, their biggest sales pitch for bitcoin is: ‘Look at how much money I’ve made on bitcoin.’ That’s it, that’s the end of the sales pitch. That’s not a sales pitch. That tells me nothing about the substance here.”

Bitcoin’s suffered a massive price decline, losing over 30 percent in one week, with ETH and other altcoins shedding more than half of their previous ATHs. Consequently, the cryptocurrency market lost more than $800 billion. Meanwhile, there seems to be a slight recovery, with BTC currently trading around $40,000

The NYU professor also called for the classification of cryptocurrency, arguing that the different crypto assets served various purposes.

“I think we need to start to separate the crypto space into: those cryptos that are trying to be currencies, those cryptos that are trying to be collectibles — millennial gold — and those cryptos that are actually commodities. Right now … we bundle them all together altogether in this once space.”

Damodaran’s call for crypto classification is similar to developments from the U.S. Congress. As previously reported by BTCManager back in March, a bill before Congress sought to provide a robust regulatory framework for digital assets and clarify whether a token is a security or commodity.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) classifying crypto-assets as “securities”, and the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) grouping tokens as “commodity” has caused confusion and uncertainty. Currently, the SEC and blockchain company Ripple are in a legal tussle, as the former alleges that XRP is a security, which Ripple continues to deny.

Crypto lending platform BlockFi is cutting interest rates on a number of crypto asset deposits, just about three months after the company lowered rates in March.

BlockFi says its decision was made based on the changing market dynamics and borrowing demand from institutional investors.

But unlike the last time, other leading top crypto lending desks such as Genesis and Canada-based Ledn are not following BlockFi’s lead move, at least for bitcoin deposits. Some of the executives at the firms are seeing increased borrowing demand compared with the previous quarter, so they need to attract the deposits to lend them out.

BlockFi announced June 25 the lower interest rates on deposits of crypto including bitcoin, ether, chainlink, litecoin and a few others will go into effect July 1. The annual percentage yield (APY) for bitcoin deposits larger than 20 BTC, for example, will go down to 0.25% from 0.5%.

BlockFi, in the announcement, said the decision was made due to “shifting market conditions.” 

“Rates on cryptocurrencies held in BIA (BlockFi Interest Account) are primarily driven by demand by institutional investors for borrowing these assets,” Rishi Ramchandani, director of business development at BlockFi in Asia, told CoinDesk in an email response. “When institutional investors demand changes, that affects the rates we can offer our BIA clients.”

Ramchandani said borrowing demand from BlockFi’s clients “continues to be stronger than ever,” but that the tenure of the loans “has gone down” along with the rates.

BlockFi’s decision led to a string of snarky comments on Twitter. 

More significantly, other major lending desks told CoinDesk they are not planning to lower their rates in the near future.

“Genesis is not lowering bitcoin rates on July 1, despite BlockFi’s rate reduction,” Matthew Ballensweig, head of institutional lending at Genesis, wrote in an email to CoinDesk. “Genesis can still pay 2.0% and more with no maximum quantity, as it still sees a robust institutional bitcoin lending market.” Genesis is owned by Digital Currency Group, which also owns CoinDesk.

The Canadian crypto lender Ledn will also keep interest rates for bitcoin deposits unchanged, according to an executive at Ledn. Ledn’s APY for bitcoin accounts with at least 2 BTC is 2.25%. Ledn is cutting deposit rates on the stablecoin USDC to 9.5% from 12% starting on July 1.

Hong Kong-based crypto lender Babel told CoinDesk via a spokesperson that it is not lowering interest rates for bitcoin deposits. Babel cut rates for tether deposits in May.

All three companies told CoinDesk they are seeing increased bitcoin borrowing demand from clients.

Some traders are betting the premium between spot cryptocurrency prices and futures, which has flattened recently, could widen again. So they’re borrowing bitcoin to short the spot market against a long position in the futures market.

That’s a contrast with the “cash and carry” arbitrage strategy that some traders pursue when futures draw a significant premium to the spot price; in that case, they buy bitcoin and short the futures to bet on a convergence of the two prices when the futures contract matures.

“Given the compression in the near-dated futures and spot basis spread, there are actually more opportunities to deploy bitcoin than last month,” Ballensweig said.

In Genesis’s first-quarter report in 2021, the company cited the wide spreads between bitcoin futures and spot markets as one reason for “lackluster” borrowing demand in the quarter. The company dropped its interest rates in March along with BlockFi.

“Borrowing BTC to short spot and long futures to bet on a widening curve doesn’t make sense when the basis is trading wide,” the report read.

According to data source Skew, bitcoin’s July expiry futures listed on major exchanges such as Binance, Huobi, OKEx, Deribit and Kraken are currently drawing an annualized basis of -20% to 3%.

Mauricio Di Bartolomeo, co-founder of Ledn, said that a lowered interest rate for USDC helps to reduce the cost of bitcoin-backed loans.

Dan Burke, managing director of institutional sales in Asia-Pacific at BitGo, said decentralized finance (DeFi) offers another source of borrowing demand for bitcoin from institutional clients, who are looking to convert bitcoin to wrapped bitcoin. These “synthetic” versions of bitcoin are configured to run on the Ethereum blockchain, where they can be deployed in DeFi trading and lending protocols for extra returns or yield. 

“From our institutional client base, we are seeing quite the opposite” from BlockFi, said Gary Pike, director of sales and trading at B2C2. “This may be because we only deal with institutions whereas BlockFi deals with retail as well.”

BlockFi’s CEO Zac Prince recently said the average balance held in an account on the platform rose fivefold in the past year, with the average balance of a retail client having jumped from $10,000 to $50,000.

“BlockFi largely borrows from retail and lends to institutional,” BitGo’s Burke said. “Some of the other lending platforms are also trading the assets themselves. It’s up to the users to decide what is riskier.”

Another possible factor behind BlockFi’s decision is the so-called Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) arbitrage trade, several market participants said.

The Grayscale arbitrage trade refers to a strategy used by investors to borrow bitcoin and deliver those to the trust in exchange for GBTC shares – relevant when the Grayscale trust shares used to trade at a premium to the net asset value (NAV) of the fund, which is more closely tied to the value of its assets, or the underlying bitcoin. 

After a six-month lockup, the shares could be sold in the secondary market to retail investors at a premium. After paying back the lender for the borrowed BTC, the investors would take the rest for profit. (Grayscale is also owned by DCG, CoinDesk’s parent company.).

As CoinDesk reported, BlockFi was one of the biggest GBTC holders as of February, when the company revealed that it holds $1.7 billion in shares of GBTC, about 5.66% of the total outstanding. 

Max Boonen, director and founder of B2C2, said in a recent interview with New Money Review that some firms had taken advantage of the GBTC arbitrage trade in order to offer attractive interest rates on crypto deposits. 

“They could borrow bitcoin from their clients (with or without collateral), put the bitcoin into GBTC, hold the GBTC shares for the six-month lock-up period, then sell them on the secondary market with a premium attached,” Boonen said.

At press time, GBTC shares are trading at a discount to the NAV, so the Grayscale carry trade has lost its charm.

The arbitrage trade “used to be a cash cow when GBTC was trading at a large premium,” said Jeff Dorman, chief investment officer at Los Angeles-based Arca.

BlockFi did not immediately respond to CoinDesk’s request for comment about GBTC trading.

On its Terms of Service page, BlockFi tells depositors:

BlockFi raised $350 million in a Series D funding round in March and there have been rumors it is raising another round of funds worth several hundred million dollars at a valuation near $5 billion.

Dorman speculated the additional funds might serve “until revenue opportunities return.” 

BlockFi declined to comment on the new funding round. But Andrew Tam, chief marketing officer at BlockFi, told CoinDesk his company is “on track” to exceed its $500 million revenue goal for 2021.

“BlockFi’s business is healthier than ever,” Tam said.

The company has faced challenges as it grows. Most recently, it incorrectly deposited to users’ accounts as part of a botched round of promotional payments. Instead of rewarding users with the stablecoin gemini dollar (GUSD) as planned, it sent BTC, sometimes millions of dollars’ worth, to certain users. In March, the platform was attacked with fake sign-ups and abusive language on its web page.

Back in April I wrote a bit about Chia, the newly introduced cryptocurrency that uses allocated free space on storage devices rather than intensive calculations on specialized processors to generate a cryptocurrency.  Conventional cryptocurrency mining, often with done using GPUs, consumes large amounts of power and has been characterized as not-ecofriendly.  In May Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla said that Tesla would no longer accept Bitcoin as payment because he said it is too hard on the environment.

The Chia cryptocurrency mining doesn’t require large amounts of energy to generate its cryptocurrency.  According to the Chia Business Whitepaper (March 1, 2021 version) proof of work in Bitcoin uses about 87 TW-hours per year as of December 2020.  Chia’s proof of space and time model involves deleting data on a storage device and then compute a “plot” or block for Chia that is written on the storage space.  Chia uses a farming rather than a mining analogy for the ways its coins get generated.  

The written plots then sit and wait until another generated plot in the Chia universe matches one of the existing plots, releasing a Chia coin.  The odds of such a match are equal to your portion of the total network space dedicated to Chia farming.  The result of this plotting and farming process uses a lot less energy, but it does use digital storage space.

Chia plots are usually generated using SSDs since they can generate the plots fast and then the plots, once created, are moved to HDDs for the farming.  Chia plowing and plotting can take 6-7 hours for each plot.  This can generate a lot of wear on the SSDs, especially lower capacity consumer grade SSds and so higher capacity enterprise class SSDs are recommended for this process.  The HDDs used to farm Chia coins are generally high capacity consumer grade HDDs.

A completely full 10TB HDD can store about 90 standard Chia blocks, which are 101.4 GiB each.  The total network space is increasing with each additional Chia farmer and as a result the odds of winning coins are dropping.  In addition, the amount of Chia coins with each plot match will decline over time.

SSDs must be replaced when they wear out, but Chia results in a lot of used HDD storage space, that must be left with its plots once written.  This has resulted in increased demand for HDDs where the farmed plots reside.  As a consequence, HDD prices have increased and some higher capacity HDDs are in short supply.  The figure below from Chia Explorer shows the size of the Chia netspace (in PiB) as of 6/29/21.

However, there are reports that the surge in HDD demand as a result of Chia is declining, and talking with folks at Chia, they believe that there is lot of underutilized digital storage in the world, particularly in HDDs and that long term people won’t want to buy new hardware for Chia mining.  

In particular many consumers are only using about 20% of their total HDD storage space.  Also, many companies and governments destroy their used digital storage devices, even after they have been sanitized (with all the data erased).  If instead, these storage devices could be written on with Chia plots, that could be a much better use of these devices versus destroying them.

Chia is working to get companies to build on top of the Chia cryptocurrency platform.  The company hopes that in the next few months major applications, carbon trading and various other activities could use Chia cryptocurrency.

Backblaze, a low cost cloud storage provider recently said in a blog that an organization called Plottair approached Backblaze about building a SaaS offering storage services to Chia farmers using Blackblaze’s B2 Cloud Storage.  Plottair aims to help Chia farmers enter this market at scale using cloud storage with a fully automated plotting service with optional cloud harvesting and multi-region download locations.  

Plottair had a plotting capacity of 50TB per day and a download window for customers to farm of 30 days.  Their storage demand led them to Backblaze to store completed plots that are then made available for customers to download.

Chia cryptocurrency led to a surge in HDD demand.  However, in the long term use of underutilized HDD storage and functional storage devices that would otherwise be destroyed could allow expansion of Chia cryptocurrency farming in the long run with less impact on new drive demand and greater utilization of existing storage.

I am the President of Coughlin Associates and a storage analyst and consultant. I have over 37 years in the data storage industry with multiple engineering and management

I am the President of Coughlin Associates and a storage analyst and consultant. I have over 37 years in the data storage industry with multiple engineering and management positions. I have many publications and six patents to my credit. I am also the author of Digital Storage in Consumer Electronics: The Essential Guide, the second edition was published by Springer. Coughlin Associates provides market and technology analysis (including reports on several digital storage technologies and applications and a newsletter) as well as Data Storage Technical Consulting services. I publish a Digital Storage in Consumer Electronics Report, a Media and Entertainment Storage Report, and an Emerging Memory Report. I am active with SMPTE, SNIA, the IEEE and other professional organizations. I am the founder and organizer of the Annual Storage Visions Conference (www.storagevisions.com), as well as the Creative Storage Conference (www.creativestorage.org). I was general chair of the Flash Memory Summit for 10 years. I am also a Fellow of the IEEE and a member of the Consultants Network of Silicon Valley (CNSV). For more information about me and my publications, go to www.tomcoughlin.com.

Reported by Nina Bambysheva, Michael del Castillo and Steven Ehrlich

The meteoric rise of bitcoin - from $10,000 since last year’s list to an all-time high of $65,000 this April –  and other major cryptocurrencies over the past few months secured a record eight spots on this year’s Fintech 50 list for blockchain and cryptocurrency focused companies. The ensuing wave of institutional adoption also brought hordes of capital to crypto startups, giving birth to new crypto unicorns (companies with a $1 billion plus valuation) and signaling a ‘coming of age’ for the industry.

First-time members include crypto lending platform BlockFi, which scored a $350 million investment, the third largest venture round ever among crypto startups, in March at a whopping $3 billion valuation, and Paxos, a blockchain infrastructure company best known as the partner for PayPal PYPL and Venmo’s crypto brokerage services, providing access to bitcoin, ether and a handful of other major cryptocurrencies to more than 350 million customers. 

Other debutants include leading cryptocurrency custodians Anchorage and Fireblocks. As more corporations and institutional investors awoke to the crypto disruption and engaged in amassing sizable bitcoin positions, crypto custody services saw a massive spike in interest. In January, Anchorage became one of the first crypto-native firms to be granted a conditional national trust bank charter by the Comptroller of the Currency, while Fireblocks saw a 2023% growth over the previous year, having transferred over half a trillion dollars in digital assets since launch in 2019. 

Amid the novel non-fungible token (NFT) frenzy, San-Francisco-based Alchemy emerged as a new breed of fintech leaders. Alchemy’s technology powers just about every major NFT platform, including OpenSea, Nifty Gateway, and NBA Top Shot, connecting users to the Ethereum blockchain, on which most non-fungible tokens, or digital collectibles, are built. 

But the veterans are still going strong. Cryptocurrency investigation and compliance company Chainalysis, previously included in the 2018 and 2020 iterations of the Fintech 50 list, achieved a unicorn status in November after closing a $100 million Series C financing round. Chainalysis could be dubbed as “the guardian of crypto” as it is helping government agencies in 50 countries analyze blockchain data to investigate illicit transactions and ensure compliance with anti-money laundering regulations. 

One notable graduate of the list is Coinbase, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States, which shook the industry and public markets with its April 14 Nasdaq debut – the largest direct listing in history. At one point during the opening day, Coinbase’s market cap exceeded $100 billion, setting a high bar for crypto startups still eyeing a public offering. Two of this year’s members, Kraken and Gemini (also cryptocurrency exchanges), have discussed going public in the future. 

But fintech is no longer just a tale of corporate success. Cryptocurrency lenders and exchanges are slowly giving way to the new hot shot of the class - decentralized finance (DeFi). An umbrella term for blockchain-based applications and protocols aiming to replace traditional financial intermediaries like banks and brokerages, DeFi skyrocketed in popularity and market capitalization over the past 12 months – from just over $1 billion in locked value in June 2020 to the current $67.9 billion. The largest among DeFi platforms are lending and borrowing protocols, such as Aave and MakerDAO, and decentralized exchanges like Uniswap and SushiSwap – all built on Ethereum. DeFi’s rise contributed to the surge of ether, Ethereum’s native cryptocurrency, which hit an all-time high of over $4,000 earlier in May. Although ineligible for the Fintech 50 list because of their composition, they deserve recognition for their success and ingenuity.

Alchemy

Headquarters: San Francisco, CA 

Sometimes called an Amazon Web Services for crypto, the company’s user interface lets non-coders write and read info on a blockchain. Alchemy provides the service for free to some clients, but charges $49 a month and up to others. Users include traditional organizations like PwC and UNICEF and crypto players like Dapper Labs, creator of the Flow blockchain. 

Funding: $96 million from Coatue, Addition and Pantera and individual investors such as Charles Schwab, Peter Thiel, Reid Hoffman, Jay Z and Will Smith. 

Latest valuation: $505 million

Bona fides: Despite having just 22 employees, its infrastructure has been used for $30 billion in transactions and has been key to the NFT explosion. 

Cofounders: CEO Nikil Viswanathan 33 and CTO  Joseph Lau, 31

Anchorage

Headquarters: San Francisco, CA 

Regulated custodian offering institutions lending, trading, financing and staking of crypto. In January, Anchorage, a South Dakota trust company, became among the first crypto-native firms to be granted a conditional national trust bank charter by the Comptroller of the Currency.

Funding: $137 million from Andreessen Horowitz, Blockchain Capital, the sovereign wealth fund for the Singapore state government and others

Latest valuation: $520 million, according to Pitchbook

Bona fides:  Working with partner (and investor) Visa V , served as custodian for first stablecoin payment on the Visa network 

Cofounders: CEO Nathan McCauley, 35 and President Diogo Monica, 35

BlockFi

Headquarters: Jersey City, NJ

Fashioning itself as a crypto wealth manager, BlockFi offers its 300,000 account holders crypto-collateralized loans at interest rates as low as 4.5% and up to 8.6% annual return on their crypto holdings via interest-bearing accounts. The four-year old startup is also preparing to launch a bitcoin-reward credit card.

Funding: $504 million from Tiger Global Management, Susquehanna Government Products, Pomp Investments and others

Latest valuation: $3 billion

Bona fides: Over the past year, assets under management have grown from $1 billion to $20 billion, while monthly revenues have jumped from $1 million to more than $45 million and its workforce has expanded from 75 to 500. 

Cofounders: CEO Zac Prince, 34, and SVP of operations Flori Marquez, 29, a member of the 2021 Forbes 30 under 30 list

Chainalysis:

Headquarters: New York City

This blockchain analysis pioneer with 200-plus employees helps governments and businesses in 50 countries analyze blockchain data to investigate illicit transactions and ensure compliance with anti-money laundering and know-your-customer regulations. 

Funding: $266 million from Addition, Accel, Benchmark and others

Latest valuation: $2 billion

Bona fides: Has 350 clients including the IRS, Gemini, Barclays and Square SQ .

Cofounders: CEO Michael Gronager, 50; Chief Strategy Officer Jonathan Levin, 31; and  former CTO Jan Moller, 49

Fireblocks:

Headquarters: New York City 

This cryptocurrency institutional custody startup is already helping more than 250 clients, including BNY Mellon, Revolut and other banks, fintechs, exchanges and hedge funds store and transfer a wide variety of digital assets. It both serves as a custodian and helps larger institutions establish in-house custody services.  

Funding: $179 million from Coatue, Ribbit, Silicon Valley Bank and others

Latest valuation: $700 million

Bona fides: Has already transferred nearly $700 billion in digital assets since launching, reflecting a 2023% increase over the previous year.

Cofounders: CEO Michael Shaulov, 38 and CTO Idan Ofrat, 39

Gemini:

One of the earliest crypto exchanges, it has grown to 350 employees and now conducts some $30 billion in transactions annually. As a licensed and regulated New York trust company, it’s well positioned for growing institutional adoption of crypto. Recently expanded into non-fungible tokens with the purchase of Nifty Gateway, now the largest NFT exchange. 

Latest valuation: $5 billion

Bona fides: As of late March, Nifty Gateway had sold $132 million of the $188 million worth of such work bought by collectors

Cofounders: CEO Tyler Winklevoss, 39 and president Cameron Winklevoss, 39, twins made famous for early legal battle with Mark Zuckerberg over the idea for Facebook. 

Kraken

Headquarters: San Francisco, California 

Second largest cryptocurrency exchange in the U.S. by transaction volume. Became the first U.S. cryptocurrency firm to receive a banking charter, obtaining a Special Purpose Depository Institution license in Wyoming, and plans to open Kraken Bank and provide accounts to current clients  this fall. Also operates reference rate and index provider, CF Benchmarks, which is used to display prices or price derivatives and indexes by Bloomberg, CME Group CME , and Nasdaq, among others.

Funding: $32 million. Also, undisclosed private equity round in April 2021

Latest valuation: Shares are trading in private markets at an implied $20 billion valuation 

Bona fides: Processed more than $230 billion in trading volume as of May 3. Average daily derivatives volume of $690 million 

Cofounder and CEO: Jesse Powell, a Cal State philosophy major whose first venture helped online gamers manage in-game currencies

Paxos

Founded (as itBit) way back in 2012, the blockchain infrastructure provider has quietly built a backbone for Paypal and Venmo’s crypto brokerage services that allows their customers to buy, hold and sell bitcoin, ethereum and a few other cryptocurrencies directly from their accounts. Additionally, Societe Generale, Credit Suisse and Nomura Instinet use Paxos’ blockchain-based service to settle trades directly with each other, without the traditional intermediary, the National Securities Clearing Corporation (NSCC)

Funding: $537 million from PayPal Ventures, Declaration Partners and others

Latest valuation: $2.4 billion

Bona fides: More than 100 institutional clients 

Cofounders: CEO Charles Cascarilla, 44 (a former Goldman Sachs financial analyst) and CEO Asia Rich Teo, 41

I report on cryptocurrencies and emerging use cases of blockchain. Born and raised in Russia, I graduated from NYU Abu Dhabi with a degree in economics and Columbia

I report on cryptocurrencies and emerging use cases of blockchain. Born and raised in Russia, I graduated from NYU Abu Dhabi with a degree in economics and Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, where I focused on data and business reporting. 

Decentraland (CRYPTO: MANA) soared 23.55% to $0.81 over 24 hours as the buzz surrounding "TO THE MOON," the world’s first virtual and decentralized music festival, intensified.

What Happened: MANA has shot up 37.31% over a seven-day trailing period. The cryptocurrency rose 26.97% and 25.59% against Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) and Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) respectively.

See Also: How To Buy Decentraland Tokens (MANA)

The festival, a collaboration between non-fungible token or NFT marketplace KnownOrigin, Bear NFT, and Illumino NFT collective will be hosted on KnownOrigin’s virtual space in Decentraland.

MetaVerse Music Festival Live DJ Sets, dancing & kick ass visuals! Come hang out with us! Join us 11 July @decentraland https://t.co/jYobQ6GCZP

— KnownOrigin.io (@KnownOrigin_io) July 4, 2021

The event is slated to begin July 11 and will feature live performances by Autograf, Fred Thurst, Ookay, Snbrn, and Win and Woo.

Why It Matters: MANA trading volumes shot up 240.85% to $688.9 million as of press time, as per CoinMarketCap. The cryptocurrency has appreciated 935.14% since the year began.

It is noteworthy that Decentraland is a virtual reality universe, which touts itself as the “first fully decentralized world.”

An exclusive collection of NFTs has been announced and will be available through the festival, as per a Decentraland announcement.

Decentraland is using Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) technology to host the event. This year the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap has gained traction thanks to the buzz surrounding Decentralized Finance or DeFi and NFTs among other factors.

See Also: Beeple Says NFT Art Is 'Absolutely' In A Bubble After Making $69M In Such A Sale

Goldman Sachs said this week that ETH “currently looks like the cryptocurrency with the highest real use potential.” The investment bank said in a note that ETH could shoot past Bitcoin as the dominant store of value among cryptocurrencies. 

Read Next: Ethereum Co-Founder Vitalik Buterin Tells Dogecoin Bull Gary 'I Love The Doge Every Day'

Open DeFi — a consortium of decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols to bridge the east to the west — launched the Open DeFi DAO this week, to incubate early-stage multi-chain DeFi protocols and applications.

“The goal of Open DAO is to develop a truly integrated multi-chain DeFi ecosystem that will open up liquid markets and establish a new operating system for finance,” said Marek Laskowski at Open DeFi. “With the support of our members and our community of more than 10,000 DeFi developers and strategists worldwide, we look forward to accelerating the next generation of DeFi.”

The DeFi industry currently holds around US$140 billion in total value locked. DAOs, or decentralized autonomous organizations, are projects that exist as smart contracts on the blockchain. Many major DeFi applications such as Uniswap, Aave and MakerDAO are now governed by DAOs, which provide a mechanism for protocol development and treasury management through smart contracts. With the rise of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and Web 3.0, DAOs are emerging as a popular way to manage tokenized assets and facilitate transparent governance within decentralized entities.

The Open DeFi DAO aims to make transacting across layer one chains a more seamless experience by supporting multi-chain use cases and new digital asset classes, including NFTs and data tokens. Anyone can join the DAO and participate through the Open DeFi DAO governance token, which will enable the community to fund and support new projects.

“Multi-chain DeFi is here to stay,” Eden Dhaliwal, founder of Open Defi and Conflux Network’s global managing director told Forkast.News in an email. 

Dhaliwal noted that in Oct. 2020, Ethereum secured nearly 98% of the total DeFi market with over US$10 billion total value locked (TVL), while the rest of the chains had less than US$150 million combined. “Today the total value on other chains is more than US$35 billion, a growth rate of 270X. This is now more than 30% of the entire DeFi market. As a result, DeFi will increasingly become more cross chain and interoperable across layer one ecosystems,” he said. 

Along with exorbitant gas prices, another factor that has contributed to this growth of multi-chain DeFi is the advancements in cross-chain infrastructure and liquidity solutions between Ethereum and other sidechains and layer twos, Dhaliwal said. For example, Conflux allows assets to transfer across Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain, Huobi ECO Chain and OKchain. 

“This multi-chain future will have a net-positive impact on Ethereum and the overall DeFi movement as faster sidechains will attract more retail investors and DeFi power users that are not just the whales that can afford Ethereum’s high gas fees,” Dhaliwal added. 

Dhaliwal also sees DeFi being applied to new digital asset classes, such as data tokens, social tokens and NFTs. “We’ll see new financial services form around these assets and offer new types of liquidity needed to take DeFi to the masses.”

Open DeFi is holding a hackathon this month to kickstart development in projects across multi-chain DeFi, stablecoins, asset and governance models, decentralized applications and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

Since its launch by China-endorsed public chain Conflux, Open DeFi has become a community-run organization with more than 30 members, making it one of the largest DeFi alliances of its kind. Earlier this year, Open DeFi created a security standards blueprint, led by Quantstamp, Barnbridge, mStable and dForce, to guide protocols in disclosing risks associated with institutional investments in DeFi protocols. 

The consortium also incubated OptyFi, a multi-chain yield aggregator that will be used to host vaults on the Open DeFi platform with the launch of the DAO.

As DeFi continues to grow, it is likely that DAOs will also continue to gain traction. 

“Interest in DAOs used to be limited to only the most active members of the blockchain community but that’s starting to change with the rise of NFTs and DeFi,” said Mark Lee, founder of blockchain agency Eightfive PR. “Since a lot of people are starting to understand the value of digital assets, they can now understand the value of having decentralized organizations that adhere to the rules set by the blockchain.”

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Top review and news platform DeFi Coins today announced a new guide for cryptocurrency enthusiasts. The platform’s latest guide titled Top 10 DeFi Guide focuses on the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector.

The platform’s launch will provide industry insiders and enthusiasts with a roundup of the best DeFi coins available for purchase and investment.

DeFi is a subcategory of the cryptocurrency space that integrates the blockchain into traditional financial services.

DeFi protocols run on automated systems, connecting parties in a transaction and facilitating these transactions seamlessly. You can find DeFi protocols that specialize in just about every financial transaction, from lending and liquidity provision to savings and asset exchange.

Over the past year, the DeFi space has been on a significant uptrend. Data from DeFi Pulse shows that DeFi protocols now hold $75.8 billion in assets locked. For an industry that is still considered to be nascent, this is beyond impressive.

With the untold potential for growth, there is a lot of attention coming to the DeFi space. Industry newcomers will be looking to find as much information as they can, and this is where the DeFi Guide comes in.

Like other subcategories of the crypto industry, users access the services of DeFi protocols via native tokens.

Depending on the protocol, token holders can access financial products in areas such as lending and borrowing, with yield distribution and repayments all controlled automatically on a decentralized network. Each DeFi protocol will have its own particular take on incentives for liquidity providers and collateralization mechanisms. The tokens themselves can provide a capital return if their value increases.

Investing funds in a DeFi protocol is easy these days. Many of the popular cryptocurrency exchanges list the tokens of DeFi projects. DeFi Coins lists a few in their guide on the best defi coins. When it comes to investing in DeFi coins, carry out your research and only invest on a regulated platform.

The DeFi Coins guide includes tokens such as UNI, the governance token for the top decentralized exchange (DEX) Uniswap.

Launched in September 2020, UNI has grown by almost 1,600 percent since launch. The asset derives its value primarily from its use on Uniswap, and with the exchange growing its user base, there is a significant upside for UNI.

Other tokens covered by the guide include LINK, the token for top blockchain oracle protocol Chainlink. Chainlink has established itself as the leading oracle protocol over the past few months, with DeFi projects and blockchain developers integrating its technology for securely receiving critical off-chain information in real-time. LINK is another token with significant price upside as Chainlink adoption grows.

The creators of the site claim that the information it provides will help individuals and corporate entities in the crypto space to make the right purchase decisions and enhance portfolio value.

Beyond analysis of the best DeFi coins to purchase, the guide also provides useful explanations of DeFi applications. There are explainers on how decentralized applications for DeFi loans and DeFi lending work,  for those exploring joining the growing ranks of DeFi enthusiasts.

In addition to the educational material, there is also a well-crafted FAQ section in case you have further questions that need addressing. The section provides both short and in-depth explanations.

The decision was made based on "changing market conditions."

The outperformance came despite a negative month for the leading cryptocurrency by market cap.

Tron, which is currently the leading blockchain for Tether’s USDT, is USDC’s fifth network.

The financial surveillance agency is pointing a finger at crypto in its new plan to combat terrorism financing.

The approval to trade the leading cryptocurrency was given by CIO Dawn Fitzpatrick, according to the report.

Swarm Markets, which claims to be the world’s first regulated DeFi protocol, says 250 customers have ponied up funds.

Troubling comments and a U.S. congressional hearing on crypto points to policymakers’ increasing intention to regulate the crypto market.

Crypto crackdowns tend to intensify amid politically sensitive times in China.

Y Combinator's basic income idea sounds creepy as hell.

“Despite there being a sign in the recent bear market that investors are scared off, we don’t see massive outflow from institutional users,” one crypto exchange executive said.

The majority of the reduction stemmed from China's move to shut down cryptocurrency mining operations in the country, with a little bit from Iran.

Uncertainty following the Board of Elections' removal of 135,000 ballots has sunk Eric Adams' chances on PredictIt and Polymarket.

“Some [extreme right-wing] groups have used so called ‘privacy coins,’” the FATF report states.

Backers of Syndicate’s community raise include Balaji Srinivasan, Jeremy Allaire, Meltem Demirors and dozens more.

Gary Lachance, an early dogecoin backer and founder of the Decentralized Dance Party, is giving away 1 million doge to seed his latest venture.

What do Vladimir Putin and Burger King have in common? 

For starters, they both have a cryptocurrency named after them. Actually, PutinCoin and Whoppercoin might be the only thing they have in common. But their namesake cryptocurrencies are among the thousands of different virtual currencies making up a growing marketplace grabbing investors’ attention.

Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum have a growing track record of holding and increasing in value over time, though recent dips have wracked the market, while lesser-known cryptos are considered much more speculative and unpredictable. And while PutinCoin and Whoppercoin belong to a category of cryptocurrencies marked more for their absurdity than their potential as either an investment or cryptocurrency, they show just how unique different types of cryptocurrencies can be.

Here’s Where to Start:The Most Popular CryptocurrenciesDecentralized FinanceDigital GoldDigital Cash or Internet MoneySoftware Platforms Stablecoin or Digital FiatMemecoins, and Other Strange Cryptocurrencies

In general, cryptocurrencies can be grouped by utility: What is the purpose of the cryptocurrency? What is its value proposition? What is it for?

“They all have different utilities, they all have different founders who have different visions for where that cryptocurrency is going,” says Mike Uehlein, founder and financial planner of WealthU advisors. Uehlein regularly talks to clients about investing in cryptocurrency. 

The Most Popular Cryptocurrencies

There are thousands of cryptocurrencies, most with very little value and unclear potential. Many advisors recommend investors stick to Bitcoin and Ethereum — if any — and pass on the smaller cryptos. 

Leading cryptocurrency news outlet CoinDesk maintains a Coindesk 20 list of the most popular cryptocurrencies currently being bought and sold. This list includes cryptocurrency assets and networks by their most common names. Some, like Bitcoin (BTC), have one name for both the blockchain network and the cryptocurrency. Others, like Ethereum, are named for the broader blockchain network, but have a different name for their associated native cryptocurrency (Ether, or ETC, in the case of Ethereum).

Updated quarterly, the list ranks cryptocurrencies based on dollar volume and other data from third-party cryptocurrency exchanges, where people can buy and sell different cryptocurrencies.

BitcoinEthereumXRPCardanoStellarUSD CoinChainlinkUniswapPolkadotBitcoin Cash

Note: This list was last updated – using the Coindesk 20 – on July 1, 2021.

1. Bitcoin

As the first cryptocurrency, Bitcoin (BTC) is also the most popular and highly valued, despite high volatility over the course of its history. Bitcoin was initially created to be used as a digital payment system, but experts say it is still too volatile to be used for that.2. Ethereum

Ether (ETH) is the cryptocurrency of the Ethereum network, an open-source blockchain upon which developers can build apps and other cryptocurrencies. It’s also the second largest cryptocurrency by market cap, behind Bitcoin. Ether’s value has risen sharply since its creation in 2013, to nearly $3,000 for one token as of late May, but still lags well behind Bitcoin’s value of nearly $40,000 per coin. 

3. XRP

XRP is the cryptocurrency of the Ripple digital payment network. Built for digital payments, XRP touts itself as a faster and more efficient way to power global payments. Ripple and XRP also allow for third-party development on other uses for XRP.

4. Cardano

Cardano (ADA) uses a technology called Ouroboros, a peer-reviewed blockchain protocol. It describes itself as a more secure and scalable way to maintain decentralization.

5. Stellar

Stellar’s native cryptocurrency is the Lumen (XLM). Stellar is designed as an “open network for storing and moving money” that allows people to create, send, and trade digital money. It’s designed to sell and trade all digital monies, not just Stellar’s own associated cryptocurrency, the Lumen — although you’ll need to own some Lumen to make transactions.

6. USD Coin

USD Coin (USDC) describes itself as “the world’s digital dollar.” Created by a global financial firm called Circle, USDC is the result of work that has been invested in by Goldman Sachs, Baidu, and IDG Capital, among others. USD Coin is tied to the U.S. Dollar, which makes its price much more stable than other cryptocurrencies. That stability lends itself more toward digital payments, while other cryptocurrencies have more potential to increase in value as investments (along with more risk of losing value, of course).

7. Chainlink

Chainlink (LINK) uses “real-world data and off-chain computation while maintaining security and reliability,” according to its website.

8. Uniswap

Uniswap (UNI) is a decentralized crypto exchange that operates on Ethereum’s blockchain. Its developers promise to get rid of unnecessary intermediaries, which it says gives users more control.

9. Polkadot

Polkadot (DOT) says its mission includes allowing different blockchains to exchange information and transactions with one another. Its website plays up data and identity security and users being in control.

10. Bitcoin Cash

Bitcoin Cash is a peer-to-peer electronic cash system, which was the original intention of Bitcoin. The currency allows you to send money anywhere for very low fees.

While each of these top cryptocurrencies is unique in its own way, they all tie into an underlying principle called  decentralized finance (DeFi).

Decentralized Finance 

In its simplest terms, decentralized finance refers to financial activities conducted without the involvement of a traditional bank. 

Think about all of the activities in which you’d normally use a bank or some other financial institution — getting a loan, insurance, investing, even using a credit card. “All of these [activities] are traditional-finance based and have intermediary companies,” says Ollie Leech, learn editor at CoinDesk. “Now people are creating these products in a completely autonomous way with [cryptocurrencies].”

It can seem counterintuitive — where else would you go for a loan, if not an established lender? But that’s one of the appeals to DeFi, says Leech. 

In the same way people have increasingly brought “smart” technology into their homes, proponents say cryptocurrency has potential to automate and digitize more and more aspects of the financial system. The appeal of this happening outside the conventional — or centralized — finance system depends on who you ask. 

Many Americans may not understand the appeal of a finance system that operates beyond government control. But things can be very different in countries with less financial stability, says Roger Aliaga-Díaz, principal and senior economist with Vanguard Investment Strategy Group. If cryptocurrencies offer as much or more stability as a given national currency, it’s an entirely different equation than if your national currency is the safe and stable U.S. dollar.

Just like there are different types of accounts and tools in conventional finance — from savings accounts to investment accounts to credit cards — that are used for different purposes, different cryptocurrencies can have similarly unique uses in this emerging decentralized finance system.

Instead of going to a bank to draw out a loan, you might “go to a decentralized application that’s not owned or operated by anyone in particular,” says Leech. 

Where conventional loans involve humans at a bank who take part in processing, reviewing, and approving loans, a DeFi loan — with funding in the form of cryptocurrency — could run via app on a network like Ethereum with an algorithm processing it. The borrower would put up some cryptocurrency as collateral, which they’d get back minus interest when they repay the loan.

“The code runs autonomously using smart contracts,” Leech says. “So once the developers release the data they’re pretty much hands-off, and everything runs automatically so there’s no intermediary.” 

Ethereum’s website offers a comparison chart contrasting decentralized from traditional finance. Along with these technical differences, a big consideration to keep in mind is that the conventional financial system is regulated to serve the interests of everyday customers, while cryptocurrency and decentralized financial systems are largely unregulated, and subject to governance and oversight only by their creators/users.

Unlike the money kept in a bank account, money you have in crypto may not be FDIC insured. Some exchanges offer this insurance while others don’t — something you’ll want to look into before buying crypto from one or another. For exchanges that don’t offer this insurance, there’s no guarantee you will be repaid if there is a hack or the exchange goes out of business.

You hold your moneyMoney held by financial institutions Transfers happen in minutesPayments can take days to processTransactions are pseudonymous Financial activity is coupled to your identity (social security number, name, address, etc.)Market is always openMarket closes Built on transparency – anyone can inspect the systemFinancial institutions are closed books.comparison-table tr td:nth-child(){border-left: 10px solid #5bffb1;border-right: 10px solid #5bffb1;}.comparison-table tr:first-child td:nth-child(){border-top: 10px solid #5bffb1}.comparison-table tr:last-child td:nth-child(){border-bottom: 10px solid #5bffb1}

With that in mind, here are some of the broad categories of cryptocurrencies that tend to organize the market.

Digital Gold

Digital gold refers to cryptocurrency comparable to real gold in its ability to store and increase in value. There’s a limited amount of gold on earth, in the same way that digital gold cryptocurrencies have a limited supply. 

“People buy gold not because they expect to be able to go to the store and spend it, but because they expect it to hold its value and maybe, probably, increase in value over time,” says Galen Moore, director of data and indexes at CoinDesk. 

The primary example of a digital gold cryptocurrency is Bitcoin, though that was not its original intention. Bitcoin was originally put forth as an electronic peer-to-peer cash system, but its volatility, among other things, limited its potential for that purpose. 

In use, such digital gold cryptocurrencies are bought and held, “for the same reason people would have diamonds, or some $100 bills, or some gold coins in a safe,” says Moore. Litecoin is another example — it’s been described as silver to Bitcoin’s gold.

Digital Cash or Internet Money

Internet money is exactly what it sounds like — you use it to buy things over the internet. 

Bitcoin was originally intended to be digital cash, but speculation led to the creation of another cryptocurrency, Bitcoin Cash (a variation of Bitcoin). Bitcoin’s price was too volatile for it to be a suitable currency, which proponents for Bitcoin Cash argued was the entire point of the currency to begin with. 

“There was a big debate about what the future of Bitcoin was going to be. Was it gold or was it cash? The people who wanted it to be more like gold won out,” says Moore. The decision was a “turning point for Bitcoin where it really went down to be digital gold.” 

But the group that wanted Bitcoin to remain internet money split off — or forked, in crypto parlance — the currency and created Bitcoin Cash. The network is devoted to digital payments (with faster processing and lower fees). In these ways, Bitcoin Cash is “meant to be cash. That’s the value proposition,” says Moore.

Though Bitcoin Cash is designed and intended for transactions, its price is still volatile and probably not your best option for making or receiving payments. 

Software Platforms  

Ethereum represents another type of cryptocurrency: It operates as a cryptocurrency network and along with its native cryptocurrency, Ether, offers a programmable crypto environment for developers. Similar to how smartphones allow third-party apps to be downloaded and used, Ethereum allows developers to create “dapps” — Ethereum-based apps that tap into the network. 

Investors can buy Ether just like they can buy Bitcoin, hoping it increases in value. Ethereum’s programmable network allows for other, more customizable uses. One example is the creation of NFTs — nonfungible tokens — that caught the attention of people far beyond the cryptocurrency community this year. NFTs are Ethereum-based digital assets, which hold value based on demand and supply on the Ethereum network.  

Stablecoin or Digital Fiat

A stablecoin pegs its value to some other currency or commodity. A digital fiat represents a fiat, or government-backed, currency on the blockchain, says Moore. One of the most popular examples of a digital fiat is Tether, a cryptocurrency whose value is pegged to the U.S. dollar. 

Tether is a system that enables you to have a cash-like currency that is always worth $1 — but only on cryptocurrency exchanges. A digital fiat like Tether comes in handy when you want to quickly move your assets within a cryptocurrency exchange. For example, if you think the market for smaller, more unpredictable coins is going to crash, you might put your money in a stablecoin like Tether, and then buy back at a lower price after the crash, says Moore. 

Stablecoins enable the exchange to flow better, says Moore. Taking the previous example, you could theoretically cash out your smaller coins for actual dollars, and then reinvest those dollars after the crash, but it could take days to convert your coins into dollars and back again, says Moore. 

Memecoins, and Other Strange Cryptocurrencies

There are thousands of cryptocurrencies available. Many of them have little to no value, and no discernable value proposition, which lands them in the category of memecoins. Experts recommend avoiding investing in this category of coins and sticking with more well-known options like Bitcoin or Ethereum, if you decide to invest in crypto at all. 

Whoppercoin and PutinCoin fall into this category of cryptocurrencies, as does another famous memecoin of recent fame: Dogecoin. While Dogecoin has seen a rise in demand — and thus value — in recent weeks, it still is highly volatile, as evidenced by its drop in value when Tesla CEO Elon Musk made it the subject of a joke on a recent episode of “Saturday Night Live.”

Any cryptocurrency that’s not Bitcoin is referred to as an “altcoin.”

Bitcoin, Litecoin

Bitcoin Cash, XRP

Ethereum, Cardano, Polkadot

Tether, USD Coin

Dogecoin, PutinCoin, Whoppercoin

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The RAMP DEFI partnership with e-Money is aimed at introducing a fiat-to-DeFi gateway for crypto users. According to an official blog post, the partnership will provide people with fiat direct access to RAMP and rUSD services. On the flip side, crypto enthusiasts holding RAMP/rUSD will also enjoy unrestricted access to e-Money’s fiat-backed digital currencies. It should be noted that e-Money has a wide array of fiat-backed digital currencies, including eEUR, eCHF, eNOK, eSEK, and eDKK.

Many schools of thought view traditional finance and decentralized finance as competitors. However, blockchain platform e-Money doesn’t hold this same notion. The Danish blockchain platform is focused on building a bridge between the decentralized finance space and traditional finance. Hence, its partnership with RAMP DEFI to build a fiat-to-DeFi gateway.

All digital currencies on e-Money are backed by actual fiat currencies. In simple terms, they are only a digital representation of respective fiat currencies. However, users can earn interest by simply holding them. Interestingly, the blockchain payment platform is built on Cosmos and will be audited by E&Y to confirm proof-of-funds.

The partnership between RAMP DEFI and e-Money is fascinating. The partnership will facilitate the seamless and hitch-free flow of liquidity between both platforms. While e-Money will be focused on the fiat-backed money markets, RAMP DEFI will facilitate the collateralizing of crypto assets. The assets may be staked or modified into the rUSD stablecoin. The stablecoin (rUSD) can then be swapped into fiat-backed digital currencies like eEUR, eCHF, eSEK, eNOK, eJPY, eUSD, and eGBP on e-Money’s DEX. This process makes it possible for the stablecoin (rUSD) holders to change their funds back to fiat while still earning staking rewards on it.

Lawrence Lim, RAMP DEFI project coordinator, disclosed that the partnership will help bring fiat and DeFi together, making it possible for interested persons to easily join the DeFi space. The ease of onboarding brought on by the partnership will furthermore serve as a growth boost for both platforms.

Martin Dyring-Andersen, CEO of e-Money, disclosed that his team actively looks forward to working with RAMP DEFI. He further added that the platform “offers a novel way to unlock liquid capital from staked digital assets.”

The e-Money protocol issues a wide range of fiat currency-backed stablecoins. Each token is backed by a reserve asset of its underlying currency. The blockchain-based platform currently supports the Euro, Swiss Franc, Swedish Krona, Norwegian Krone, and the Danish Krone (DKK). Plans are in place to launch several other fiat-backed digital currencies this year.

Other exciting partnerships expected this year include strategic integration with Ethereum, Cosmos Hub, and Avalanche.

RAMP DEFI, on the other hand, is focused on unlocking liquidity from staked assets. With RAMP DEFI, users will be able to unlock their liquid capital and reinvest it while still earning staking rewards.

Interestingly, RAMP DEFI recently entered a 3-way partnership with TomoChain and Injective Protocol. It also recently added funds to its Buyback wallet.

At the time of publication, RAMP was trading at $0.331083, with a market cap of $44,516,674 and a 24-hour trading volume of $8,547,104.

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The decentralized finance movement was a ticking time bomb waiting to detonate when it finally exploded in 2020. From automated market makers to the industry’s current obsession with liquidity mining, DeFi has grown leaps and bounds over the last year.

Most decentralized finance applications are deployed on the Ethereum blockchain, bringing billions of dollars onto the network and pushing it to its maximum operational threshold. While the capabilities of the underlying network may seem like the only thing holding DeFi back, Ethereum isn’t slacking either.

While some vocal community members believe this pump is the result of a bubble similar to the initial coin offering boom of 2017, there are many reasons to think this isn’t the case.

DeFi has brought a breath of fresh air to the cryptocurrency space, spawning countless new tokens that have revolutionized decentralized lending and borrowing services. The short-lived Yam Finance, which attempted to simplify the yield farming experience and transform blockchain governance into a practical model, quickly became one of the fastest-growing platforms in the DeFi space.

Projects like Uniswap even resurrected the concept of decentralized exchanges using an automated market maker model. This allows the system to price trades without relying on liquidity from a counterparty. Instead of using order books, the AMM prices assets using the ratio of tokens in a liquidity pool to determine supply and demand.

Uniswap’s surge in use has been fueling the DeFi engine for quite some time, with daily trading volume rising from around $1 million to $1 billion between July 2020 and September 2020. Without being tied down by order books, Uniswap can execute orders on-chain, meaning transactions are made and settled on the network directly, and this has become one of Ethereum’s most prominent features.

This has driven the number of smart contract calls on Ethereum to skyrocket, reaching new all-time highs and creating a token economy that is increasingly being managed by code. However, while DeFi’s trustless ecosystem has brought greater efficiency levels and more automation opportunities, it’s still far more complicated than traditional offerings have become.

This is a major problem that DeFi needs to address before it can attain more mainstream adoption. The act of buying and selling cryptocurrencies already needs work from a consumer’s perspective, but in its current state, DeFi is still very much “function over form.” Outfits like Yearn.finance have brought algorithmically managed portfolios to DeFi, but there’s still a lot of work to be done.

“Yield farming is not sustainable, but it is helping to bootstrap the industry in the short term and attract developers,” said Rune Christensen, founder of veteran DeFi platform MakerDAO, in a conversation with Cointelegraph, adding:

He also mentioned that DeFi is currently fully reliant on the Ethereum platform, especially because it’s dependable on composability between current DeFi applications and ETH as a primary source of collateral and stability. However, there may be other issues in the way of DeFi’s growth.

This is a sentiment shared by many members of the community. According to Illia Polosukhin, CEO of Near Protocol — a blockchain that allows for the creation of decentralized applications and is interoperable with Ethereum — DeFi might just keep growing on Ethereum.

“Most of the applications are built to work with and around current limitations and they would be only moderately successful on other chains,” he said. “It’s not just the apps themselves, but the whole ecosystem of users, assets, other applications, and integrations.” However, there may be other issues in the way of DeFi’s growth.

Those issues include the launch of Eth2 and its potential effects on decentralized finance. The MakerDAO founder claimed that it will likely have a smaller impact than expected, with fewer new DeFi apps. “Layer 2 scalability solutions with high-security bridges will probably enable more retail-focused DeFi,” he said.

Introducing more complexity is taxing for the end-user, especially with the rough user interface/user experience systems that seem prevalent throughout the space. Still, this would allow DeFi smart contracts to interact and transact automatically without any human help across multiple platforms.

At the moment, Ethereum benefits from application composability and greater liquidity than any other smart-contract-enabled blockchain, but dismantling either of these can open the floodgates for DeFi apps to shift platforms.

The potential effects of Ethereum 2.0 on DeFi are still unclear. Ideally, the platforms should bring scalability, composability and liquidity, but this is no mean feat, especially while many decentralized applications are migrating to layer-two solutions and application-specific chains. According to Kevin Davis, chief technology officer of the Kava DeFi platform:

Wrapped assets are also a considerable part of the DeFi space, with Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) bringing the original cryptocurrency, Bitcoin (BTC), to smart contract platforms. Wrapped Bitcoin is an ERC-20 token backed by actual Bitcoin, and it has around $6 billion worth in circulation on Ethereum at the time of writing.

While most DeFi tokens are built on the ERC-20 standard — a framework for designing tokens on Ethereum — ETH is not. Because this framework was only created after ETH, the token isn’t technically compliant with the ERC-20 standard. But with Wrapped Ether (WETH), it can now also effectively be used as a regular token on DeFi platforms.

With wrapped assets, Ethereum can bring liquidity to any tokenized asset on a variety of platforms, bringing hundreds of millions of dollars to the network. The surge in smart contract calls and the overall number of transactions has pushed ETH gas fees to a new level, with high gas prices becoming quite typical. Polosukhin told Cointelegraph:

During a token launch, this can be catastrophic, as hordes of users flood the network to get their hands on it as soon as possible. This leads to miners prioritizing transactions with higher fees, which then inflates transaction costs as the people in the queue try to cut to the front of the line.

While high transaction fees could hurt the space, more incentivized miners ultimately secure the network better. From this perspective, the increase in miner fees could also be seen as a sign that Ethereum is becoming more secure. However, this makes the barrier for entry higher than some would be comfortable with. Small investments make small profits, and with similar fees for both $100 and $100,000 transactions, users transferring large amounts have an undisputed advantage.

That being said, Ethereum is shifting away from the proof-of-work model that incentivizes miners through block rewards and miner fees, instead opting for a proof-of-stake model on the upgraded Eth2 network. Further, the median Ethereum average weekly transfer value has been steadily growing, which is a strong signal that the network is shifting toward fewer novice investors.

Beyond the promise of Ethereum 2.0, scaling the “world computer” has been an ongoing effort for the last few years. The recently launched Optimistic Ethereum testnet is a layer-two scaling solution project that offers instant transactions at a much lower cost. Further, this can be implemented using the current Ethereum infrastructure, and popular DeFi projects like Synthetix, Uniswap and Chainlink have signed on as early adopters.

DeFi and Ethereum are a codependent couple, and while their progress and development run in parallel, they are both growing steadily yet independently. With solutions like the Optimistic testnet and the upcoming shift to proof-of-stake, the Ethereum platform seems primed for even more DeFi action in 2021.

According to MakerDAO’s Christensen, the biggest bottleneck for developing new DeFi applications is “the lack of clarity around how to interact safely with legal and real-world political and financial systems in order to gain real economic relevance.”

As both ETH’s and the DeFi industry’s market capitalization grows, new projects are setting up shop faster than ever before. DeFi has grown into a burgeoning arena for innovation and development in the blockchain space, and with how it grew against insurmountable odds last year, there will be far more windows for growth in the times ahead.