decentralized exchanges

Non-Custodial Dex Platforms Continue to Expand — Curve, Pancakeswap, Sushiswap, Uniswap Lead the Pack

26/10/2021 by Idelto Editor

Five years ago, there was a large quantity of digital currencies and blockchains, but there were very few trading platforms that dealt with decentralized exchange. Since the boom of decentralized finance (defi), there’s now a myriad of decentralized exchange (dex) platforms that allow people to swap funds in a private, non-custodial manner. These days the biggest dex applications are catering to a variety of blockchain networks via cross-chain technology.

Curve’s TVL Nears $20 Billion, Curve DAO Token Jumps 82%, Pancakeswap and Sushiswap Follow With TVLs Over $10 Billion

Defi has exploded in popularity during the last 12 months and there are numerous applications and platforms tending to the needs of traders and liquidity providers. Currently, there’s $245.1 billion in total value locked in defi platforms today across blockchains like Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche, Polygon, Binance Smart Chain, and more.

Data from defillama.com indicates that the lending system Aave has the largest dominance metric today with 7.95% of the $245 billion, or $19.46 billion TVL. Aave is compatible with Ethereum, Polygon, and Avalanche and the TVL has increased 18.13% during the last seven days.

In terms of dex TVL rankings, Curve is the number one contender with $18.21 billion and compatibility with seven different blockchains. The Binance Smart Chain (BSC) dex application, Pancakeswap, has the second-largest TVL with $5.77 billion across only one chain.

The Curve dex cryptocurrency, otherwise known as curve DAO token (CRV), has increased in value 82.4% during the last week. Cake, the native currency for the Pancakeswap dex, is only up 0.7% this past week. Sushiswap is just below the BSC dex with a $5.6 billion total value locked across 13 unique blockchains. Sushiswap’s native asset, SUSHI, has gained 3.0% during the last seven days.

Uniswap, which leverages the Ethereum blockchain, has a TVL of around $5.26 billion, up 8% during the last week. UNI has gained 4.7% this past week and Uniswap version 3 is the sixth-largest dex in terms of total value held.

Uniswap’s Weekly Volume Close to $10 Billion, Dex Aggregators Capture 26% of Trades, Non-Ethereum Dex Platform TVLs Rise

Between Uniswap, Sushiswap, Curve, and 0x Native, the dex application Uniswap commands the most trade volume with $9.3 billion during the last seven days. Uniswap captures 68.2% of the volume across 14 different Ethereum-based dex platforms.

Meanwhile, Sushiswap has seen $2.2 billion in volume this week and Curve has seen $667 million. Dex aggregator platforms like 1inch and 0x API have around 26% of the trade volume. 1inch has seen $2.1 billion in weekly trades and 0x API $1.2 billion.

In terms of TVL, top dex applications from other blockchains besides BSC and ETH include Avalanche’s Trader Joe, Solana’s Saber, Raydium, and Serum, and Tron’s Justswap (JST) application. The Avalanche (AVAX)-based Trader Joe dex has increased its TVL by 33.11% this week and the Solana (SOL)-based Serum’s TVL jumped 20.74%.

What do you think about the dex volumes and total value locked in these defi applications? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

US Senator Warren Presses SEC to Address Crypto Exchange Outages, High Transaction Fees, Financial Inclusion

16/09/2021 by Idelto Editor

At the U.S. Senate Banking Committee hearing Tuesday, Senator Elizabeth Warren called on the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Gary Gensler, to increase oversight of cryptocurrency. She brought up several problems she associates with cryptocurrency that could hurt small investors.

Senator Elizabeth Warren Says ‘There’s a Whole List of Problems With Crypto’

U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren questioned U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler about several issues regarding cryptocurrency at the Senate Banking Committee hearing Tuesday.

The senator from Massachusetts began by noting that last Tuesday, “In a matter of hours, $400 billion in market value disappeared.” She then pointed out that as the prices of cryptocurrencies tumbled, “several of the biggest crypto exchanges had outages, which kept customers from making withdrawals or trades.”

Questioning how this affects small retail investors, “who don’t have a lot of money to lose,” Warren described a hypothetical situation. “Let’s say that last Monday I took out the last sliver of my savings. I went on the crypto exchange Coinbase. I bought $100 worth of ether. Then I woke up early on Tuesday morning, I saw that the market looked like it was beginning to tank, and I thought I better sell right now,” she said, adding:

But when I tried to sell, Coinbase, the exchange, was down. So, Chair Gensler, was there anything I could do to get my money out?

Gensler replied: “Not at a federal agency because they [Coinbase] haven’t yet registered with us, even though they have dozens of tokens that may be securities.”

Senator Warren then described another hypothetical situation. “Instead of buying ether on Coinbase last Monday, I decided instead to put that $100 towards buying a new, cool token — let’s call it ‘new coin’ — that was being hyped on Twitter,” she detailed. “New coin is available only on a ‘decentralized’ crypto exchange, so to buy it I had to pay a fee, about $20, to the crypto miners who processed the transactions … Then of course I woke up on Tuesday morning and the market was tanking.”

She asked Gensler how much she would have to pay the exchange to sell her coins and get back into dollars fast, stating:

How much would I have to pay to get out of defi on Tuesday to sell my coins. Would I have had to pay a second $20 fee or might I have had to pay even more?

The SEC chairman promptly replied, “I don’t know because it will be all in the user agreement.” He added that many platforms “are only decentralized in name only,” citing that “There is a user agreement. There’s something you are doing with this platform. There’s a governance token. There’s usually some fees.”

While the SEC chairman stated that he does not know what fee a particular exchange charges, Senator Warren brought up network fees.

“We do know some of the fees from last Tuesday. The fee to swap between two crypto tokens on the Ethereum network was more than $500, obviously way more than the $100 I was trying to trade in the first place,” she exclaimed, noting:

The question I have is, in the face of these high, predictable fees, small investors could easily get jammed and wiped out entirely.

Senator Warren then asserted that cryptocurrency is not a path to financial inclusion. “Chair Gensler, advocates say crypto markets are all about financial inclusion. But the people who are most economically vulnerable are the ones who are most likely to have to withdraw their money the fastest when the market drops. Does this sound like a path to financial inclusion to you?”

Gensler replied: “It’s a highly speculative asset class. It doesn’t sound like the path that you mentioned.”

Warren continued:

There’s a whole list of problems with crypto: unreliable tech, scams, devastating climate impact. But high, unpredictable fees can make crypto trading really dangerous for people who aren’t rich.

She concluded, “Regulators need to step up to address crypto regulatory gaps,” emphasizing, “Chair Gensler, I expect you and the SEC to take a leading role in getting this done.”

What do you think about what Senator Elizabeth Warren said to SEC Chairman Gensler? Let us know in the comments section below.

Data Shows Decentralized Finance Took a Hit in Q2 but Is Still Booming

17/07/2021 by Idelto Editor

While decentralized finance took a hit in Q2, stats still show there is an important movement in these protocols. Data taken from Messari’s Q2’21 defi review show that decentralized exchanges are busy settling important numbers.

Decentralized Finance Bruised but Still Up

The decentralized finance paradigm stormed the market this year, and while it certainly took a hit, it is still healthy. According to numbers extracted from Messari’s Q2’21 defi review report, there is still significant activity going on in the decentralized market. Decentralized exchanges, one of the core engines of the ecosystem, are still moving important amounts of funds. These settled $405 billion during the last quarter, an increase of 83% over the $221 billion settled on Q1.

However, exchange volumes fell during May to $95 billion from the $203.5 billion in May. The general deceleration of the cryptocurrency market affected the sector significantly. In any case, June was a noteworthy month in the story of decentralized exchanges, even with the steep fall.

Uniswap V3 launched during Q2, becoming the dominating force in the environment in less than two weeks. Uniswap V3 now settles 40% of the volumes exchanged in decentralized finance. Pancakeswap, the top exchange on the Binance Smart Chain (BSC), follows in third place with its volumes falling after the May crash.

Reaching for Institutions

Some of the top protocols in the decentralized environment are expanding into institutional markets, to extend their reach to more stable business. This is the case of Compound, a leading decentralized exchange that launched Treasury, a fixed rewards product for businesses last month. Metamask, the preferred wallet for decentralized finance, also launched an initiative last April trying to capture the segment of institutions wanting to dabble in the defi ecosystem.

With current interest rates, any of these institutions can propose a product that offers more yield than traditional finance products. Aave, another decentralized finance protocol, will also offer Aave Pro later this month, to draw in these institutional players.

In the same vein, Circle, part of the consortium that issues USDC, is going public via a SPAC deal later this year. While Tether still holds most of the stablecoin dominance, USDC has become popular on decentralized finance protocols in the last quarter.

What do you think about defi’s performance during Q2 2021? Tell us in the comment section below.

Another Binance Smart Chain Project Turtledex Rug Pulls With Tokens Worth $2.5M Confirmed Stolen

22/03/2021 by Idelto Editor

The team behind Turtledex protocol, a Binance Smart Chain (BSC) project has reportedly rug pulled its investors shortly after raising 9,000 Binance tokens worth $2.5 million. Immediately following the confirmation of the theft, the value of the protocol’s native token TTDX, reportedly plunged to near zero. At the time of writing, the social media accounts associated with the protocol appear to have been deleted.

The Rug Pull

As one report explains, Turtledex, which touted itself as a decentralized storage platform for users, successfully duped users by claiming it could help them “keep data and preserve files without needing to keep them on their computer.” These claims initially helped the Turtledex team to raise funds via the pre-sale round “in just two hours on Monday 15th.”

Next, the team would follow up this successful fundraising round by “opening their liquidity pools on two major BSC Decentralized exchanges (DEXs): Pancakeswap and Apeswap.” The native tokens, TTDX, “were unlocked and opened to circulation on March 18th at 15:00 UTC and the price quickly pumped above its pre-sale value.”

However, just 24 hours later, a Twitter user named Defistalker warned TTDX holders of a possible exit scam after noticing the removal of liquidity on the two DEXs. In an initial tweet, which shares the screenshot of the alleged theft, Defistalker said:

Liquidity on both Apeswap and Pancakeswap has been removed 10hrs ago and swapped to ETH, split to 9 wallets, all sent to Binance.

Stopping Exit Scammers

Consequently, some users are now asking Binance to intervene by freezing the stolen funds and reimbursing the affected investors. Although Binance had not formally responded at the time of writing, some users are pinning hopes on remarks made in the past by the exchange’s executives. For instance, in a tweet on March 15, 2021, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) hints that his organization is actively involved in helping investors track down funds after rug pulls.

Still, some users have expressed doubts about Binance’s willingness or ability to will help after noting the exchange’s failure to help Meerkat Finance investors following the rug pull. Approximately $31 million was siphoned from Meerkat Finance (another BSC project) on March 4 shortly after developers reported a hacking attack.

Meanwhile, some investors like Twitter user Defistalker are now querying the value of auditing smart contracts when “developers can simply pull liquidity to dump.” Defistalker said:

“Turtledex (TTDX) smart contract was audited by Techrate1 on February 21, 2021. Whilst no big issues were found, it asks the question, what is the purpose of a smart contract audit? If developers can simply pull liquidity to dump, are we even asking the right questions?”

Can smart contracts audits help pre-empt rug puls in the Defi space? You can share your thoughts in the comments section below.

$100 Swaps: Ethereum Dex Volumes Saw $39 Billion Last Month Despite ‘Insane’ Trading Fees

16/01/2021 by Idelto Editor

During the last 12 months, Ethereum-based decentralized finance (defi) solutions and decentralized exchange (dex) platforms have been very popular. Dex applications, in particular, have seen massive demand and during the last 30 days, dex trade volumes have reached $39 billion in swaps. However, one of the biggest issues confronting dex users continues to be the enormous fees associated with interacting with platforms like Uniswap and other dex platforms.

Ethereum’s Decentralized Exchange Platforms See Record 30 Day Trade Volumes

Dex applications like Uniswap, 1inch, Sushiswap, 0x, Matcha, Kyber, and others have been very popular platforms during the last year. The defi market aggregator defipulse.com shows that there’s over $22 billion in value locked into defi platforms today. A considerable amount of this locked ether value is also represented by dex applications and the growing user base. On January 14, 2021, stats from Dune Analytics shows that during the last month, dex trade volumes gathered $39.86 billion. Dex applications have seen $12 billion in swaps during the last seven days, and the top dex application in terms of volume is Uniswap.

Uniswap’s trade volume is followed by Sushiswap, Curve, 0x, and Balancer respectively. Every week, Uniswap and Sushiswap are seeing billions in global trade volume and Uniswap is the fourth largest defi application, according to current stats with around $2.77 billion total value locked (TVL). However, even though decentralized exchanges have seen large TVL balances and significant trade volume, the crypto community has been flabbergasted by the fees associated with Ethereum-based dex applications.

Crypto Users Complain About Massive Dex Fees

For instance, the popular Bitcoin researcher and author, Hasu, recently said that some “defi projects produce nearly as much cash flows from fees as the entire Bitcoin network does.” During the last two weeks, a great number of crypto proponents have been complaining about the massively sized fees associated with dex platforms like Uniswap and Sushiswap.

Moreover, in some cases, people have had to eat the associated onchain trading fee, but the swap ultimately fails. On January 7, 2021, the bitcoin pundit Brad Mills tweeted about paying a $120 dex trading fee.

“Just a casual $120 fee to use Uniswap on Ethereum,” Mills said. “Defi is the future of finance for the unbanked,” he added sarcastically. A few hours ago, one individual wrote: “I’m gonna go cry now over the Uniswap fees I just paid.”

In another tweet on Friday, one user explained that the “fees on Uniswap are insane— They need to figure out a way to curb this or Uniswap will plateau as a decentralized exchange,” he added while sharing a picture of the Uniswap fees on Friday.

The screenshot shows that the slowest transaction will cost $40 in ether fees, and that transaction should settle in 12 minutes. A medium-speed transaction that will settle in a single minute, costs over $58 dollars to interact with Uniswap. Moreover, the fastest confirmation time of under 30 seconds will set a trader back $100 just for the fee. “Oh my god these Uniswap fees are insane…,” another person tweeted on Friday afternoon. Another person complained and said they wanted to trade but dex fees are too high.

“I wanna start trading on Uniswap, but I’m not rich yet so….fees. Any alternatives?” the person asked.

Of course, throughout all the discussions about the high dex fees, a great number of crypto community members shilled their own favorite blockchain with claims of lower fees. Despite Ethereum’s colossal lead in the decentralized finance (defi) space, many people believe the network will falter if fees are not improved in the near future. One person even compared the Ethereum network to BTC’s fee and transaction congestion issues and referred to both network’s as antiquated tech.

“ETH is the Bitcoin of Defi,” explained the Twitter account dubbed ‘Green Eggs-n-Sam.’ “Old tech, failed to scale >10 yrs., fees [are a] fu**ing joke, flawed incentives, running on fumes of first-mover advantage, practically unusable w/o a centralized layer 2, all the while, superior solutions, and off-ramps are appearing left and right.” The crypto proponent’s harsh criticism actually was a fairly popular tweet with 165 likes at the time of publication.

What do you think about the recent dex trade volumes and the massive fees associated with dex application swaps? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.