Stablecoin usage lost steam amid the recent crypto market downturn. From peaking at nearly $2 billion on May 19, the daily transaction volume has fallen off its 2021 average by about 60%. The significant drop begs the question about stablecoin activity in the current market environment. Unsurprisingly, the two cryptocurrencies that remain in a tight race for stablecoin dominance are Tether (USDT) and USD Coin (USDC). However, the market holds a fine distinction between the two, particularly with their corresponding reserve holding. Credit rating agency Fitch Ratings even warned recently about Tether's risk triggering a destabilization in short-term credit markets, …

Security tokens may be poised for exponential growth as security tokenization industry players reveal optimistic forecasts based on surging demand. With that, the market size by 2025 could reach the $3 trillion mark, according to the area2invest report, a security token marketplace. The study by the Liechtenstein-based security token marketplace also suggests a market compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 56.9%. As Bernhard Thalhammer, head of issuer relations at area2invest, told Cointelegraph: “Every day, we receive several requests, not only from blockchain or crypto companies but also from more traditional businesses which have very concrete STO projects in mind.” He …

As one of the most eagerly anticipated rollouts of the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector, Uniswap v3 went live on May 5. The upgrade targeted greater capital efficiency and better flexibility for liquidity providers. The concept of Uniswap v3 includes features such as concentrated liquidity — which allows liquidity providers (LPs) to allocate their capital in certain price ranges rather than distribute liquidity across the entire price curve — as well as multiple fee tier systems which help LPs to adjust to varying degrees of risk. The launch of Uniswap v3 sparked discussions across the crypto community: While some people expected …

Launched in August 2020 as a fork of the Uniswap decentralized exchange, SushiSwap briefly surpassed its competitor. Now ranking third behind Uniswap’s v3 and v2, the DEX rolls out numerous integrations with major networks beyond its native Ethereum blockchain to offer users a single entry point and lower fees. The SushiSwap protocol is one of the largest proponents of a multi-chain future in decentralized finance as the DEX is already live on Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain, Polygon, Avalanche and Fantom. Data by Covalent provides insight on SushiSwap across these five chains. Data reveals the most popular chain by the number …

Bitcoin’s status as legal tender in El Salvador has recently sparked a new round of discussion concerning Bitcoin (BTC) and its role in the world economy. Despite ambiguous reactions from institutions such as JPMorgan Chase and the World Bank, some feel that Bitcoin’s status as a means of payment is now more explicit than ever. Meanwhile, the perception of Bitcoin among retail users is contrasted sharply by institutional uncertainty. A recent study by CryptoRefills, a company that sells vouchers and gift cards in exchange for cryptocurrency, seems to suggest that many users view Bitcoin as a useful way to pay …

The savage sell-off that took place in mid-May fueled volatility in markets and triggered liquidations among numerous decentralized finance protocols. Like an earthquake, the market fall exacerbated the biggest wave of liquidations in DeFi history. The market experienced a higher amount of liquidation on May 19 than in the past two years in the DeFi space. As part of the Market Insights bi-weekly newsletter, Cointelegraph Consulting teamed up with Covalent to investigate the liquidations on Aave, Compound and Maker. While the three DeFi protocols account for nearly 50% of all DeFi total value locked, according to DappRadar, they saw liquidations …

Is tokenization of securities the way of the future? In an interview with Raiffeisen Bank International, the bankers leading its blockchain research hub stated that indeed, by 2030, most securities will have been tokenized. To gain a deeper understanding of how blockchain technology can transform traditional stock exchanges, Cointelegraph Research compiled a dataset of all security token offerings and found that almost $5 billion was raised in 2020. Cointelegraph’s first report on security tokens explains how bond and stock tokenization works, how many assets have already been tokenized, what returns they have provided, and how they are regulated in different …

In the midst of the hectic crypto market, the gas fees in the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector have skyrocketed, once again highlighting the value of layer-two scaling solutions. Cointelegraph Consulting teamed up with Covalent to discover the numbers behind Polygon, the network that is onboarding an increasing number of decentralized applications, from SushiSwap to bZx. Aave, DeFi’s lending giant, launched on Polygon this April and has already lured away about 66,000 unique users to the layer-two version. Nearly $12 billion has been deposited since the launch, and over $7 billion has been borrowed. Though what is important is that only …

The fundamental value drivers of cryptocurrencies have been questioned a lot since the 2017 bull run. Professional investors that are considering an allocation into digital assets are wondering what the assets’ real value is. A recent report by crypto-asset manager Iconic Funds and Cryptology Asset Group, a leading European asset manager for crypto assets and blockchain-based businesses, aims to shed light on this topic. The fundamental value of each cryptocurrency depends on its unique use case, which makes it impossible to apply a single valuation method to every token. For example, Bitcoin (BTC) can be analyzed with traditional commodity valuation …

Although Aave was launched in the beginning of 2020, it has experienced significant growth in total deposits and daily deposits since the summer of 2020. Overall, Aave has totalled over $45 billion in deposits, with 2021 seeing the protocol average $231 million in deposits per day. More than 46,000 unique Ethereum users have become lenders on Aave, with the average all-time deposit reaching $173,000. Aave’s recent launch on Polygon and the introduction of its liquidity program was followed by a rapid increase in total value locked from $5.4 billion on April 25 to roughly $11.4 billion on May 12, according …

Following the Fei Protocol falling short of expectations at the beginning of April, much ink has been spilled on the doomed design of the FEI stablecoin and the possible ways to recover. Covalent’s latest findings in Cointelegraph Consulting’s biweekly newsletter adds up to the discussion by taking a closer look at how the Fei Protocol post-genesis drama unfolded, by the numbers. Three weeks ago, Fei Protocol raised 639,000 Ether (ETH) worth roughly $1.3 billion at the end of the genesis event. The data reveals that the event attracted 17,567 unique users, but it turned out to be heavily dominated by …

Cointelegraph Consulting’s 2021 ranking of the top five United States-based regulated crypto asset management firms highlights that Bitcoin’s explosive growth in price has catapulted many digital asset managers past the half-billion-dollar mark. As more and more investors are turning to the digital asset market, these companies are on track to becoming important players in the U.S. financial industry. Grayscale Investments Grayscale is one of the largest and well-known firms in the crypto world, which was founded in 2013 by its parent organization — Digital Currency Group. Grayscale now has a total of more than $40 billion in assets under management, …