Fresh institutional and retail investor inflows into the cryptocurrency market have led to bull market conditions for many top tokens from blue-chips like Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) to more recently established DeFi projects like AAVE and Synthetix (SNX). Exchange tokens are another easily overlooked sub-sector of the market but they have been performing exceptionally well in 2021 as increases in trading volumes results in a larger pool of fees to collect when the exchange’s native token is used for settlement. Native exchange tokens are also typically used as the base pair for funding new listings and token buybacks. Here …

As decentralized finance continues to increase it hold on the wider cryptocurrency market, Binance Smart Chain (BSC) is beginning to emerge as a suitable option for traders looking to escape from high transaction fees on the Ethereum (ETH) network. With more attention being paid to BSC, DeFi projects operating on the chain have also seen an influx of buying activity in recent weeks as token holders rush to supply liquidity for recently launched protocols. One such project is Venus (XVS), an algorithmic money market and synthetic stablecoin protocol designed specifically for the BSC. Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView shows …

PancakeSwap (CAKE) has emerged as a rising star in the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector with the recent surge in price helping the food-themed token become the first billion-dollar project on the Binance Smart Chain (BSC). Data from Cointelegraph Markets and Tradingview shows that the price of CAKE has risen 520% since reaching a low of $1.89 on Feb. 3 to establish a new all-time high of $11.12 on Feb. 17. This propelled its total market cap above $1 billion for the first time. As DeFi has grown in prominence with a majority of top projects currently operating on the Ethereum …

The total value locked in decentralized finance — a measure of the total value of assets committed to the DeFi ecosystem —has marked a new all-time high close to $40 billion. According to DeFi Pulse, the figure hit the $39.79 billion mark on the morning of Feb. 10. While the bullish milestone is undoubtedly a reflection of soaring prices across the crypto markets, as a metric, total value locked, or TVL, gives a somewhat crude picture of what is actually going on in the world of DeFi. This is because the metric largely ends up tracking the surface impact of …

As decentralized finance grows in prominence, a battle of the DEXs is brewing between several of the top protocols like Uniswap (UNI), SushiSwap (SUSHI) and Curve DAO (CRV) as the growing list of platforms vie for investor liquidity and transactions on the network. In terms of total value locked, DeFi lending platforms currently dominate the space with the top 3 positions currently occupied by Maker (MKR), AAVE, and Compound (COMP). Decentralized exchanges hold the next three positions with Curve DAO recently surpassing Uniswap to rank fourth in terms of TVL. An added boost of attention for CRV came on Feb. …

In the traditional investing world ‘unicorn’ is a term used by venture capitalists to describe a privately held startup valued at more than $1 billion. Typically these startups have strong fundamentals and oftentimes a first-mover advantage that helps them rapidly rise in value to become prized investment opportunities for yield-seeking funds. Some of the best-known unicorns include Elon Musk’s SpaceX, a private rocket and spacecraft manufacturer with a valuation of $46 billion, and Coinbase, the largest U.S.-based cryptocurrency exchange with a current valuation of $8 billion. While the world's attention has been focused on the Coronavirus pandemic, the outcome of …

Launched in September 2020, PancakeSwap is a decentralized exchange (DEX) running on Binance Smart Chain. Instead of allowing its users to trade ERC-20 and ERC-721 tokens, the DEX focuses exclusively on Binance Chain BEP20. By using an automated market maker (AMM), the DEX allows tokens to be exchanged with no need for order books. This is quite similar to Uniswap's liquidy pools which are automated by smart contracts. In addition to its traditional functions, PancakeSwap offers staking for its liquidity providers. There's also a lottery for users holding 10 or more CAKE and by opting for a chain with much …

SUSHI, the native token of SushiSwap, rallied by 73% in the past four days. However, some investors believe the DeFi token may still have a lot more room to run. SushiSwap is an automated market maker (AMM) that allows users to trade cryptocurrencies in a decentralized manner on the Ethereum blockchain. Why is SUSHI undervalued at $2 billion? The market cap of SUSHI achieved $2 billion as its price surpassed $16. But, there are three key reasons why it could still be undervalued. First, Uniswap, its direct competitor, is hovering at around $6 billion market cap, despite decreasing gap in …

Decentralized finance (DeFi) has emerged as one of the driving forces of crypto sector growth, and it is also establishing itself as an integral component driving widespread adoption of cryptocurrencies. A recent report from Delphi Digital points out that there has been a 440% increase in “the circulating market cap of leading DEX protocols over the past 30 days,” which has also led to “the trading volume they facilitate to rise along with them.” DEX volume in January 2021 set a new all-time high combined total above $55 billion, more than double the previous high of $26 billion in September …

Bitcoin (BTC) price spent the day trading in a tight range between $32,000 and $34,000. At the time of writing, the digital asset is pinned below the descending trendline resistance and each attempt to cross above it is met by selling. Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView show a price increase of 4.14% for the top cryptocurrency, which currently trades at $33,840. In light of the sideways price action, Ki Young Ju, the CEO of the cryptocurrency analysis firm CryptoQuant, spotted a potential bullish indicator that may indicate a price breakout in the near future for Bitcoin. According to Ju, …

Following its merger into the Yearn ecosystem, SushiSwap has been making significant inroads into the market share of leading decentralized exchange Uniswap. On Jan. 29, Messari researcher Mira Christanto tweeted data illustrating that Uniswap’s share of the Automated Market Maker sector has declined as Sushi’s share expanded from mid-December until last week. Christanto asserts the Yearn merger has given Sushi a newfound legitimacy, allowing the project to move past criticism of the project that launched in August as a clone of Uniswap and secured TVL early on via a so-called “vampire” liquidity attack. In November, Sushi attracted further liquidity away …

A recent report from CoinMetrics suggests that when a new altseason starts it will play out in a way that is vastly different from the market of 2017-2018. According to the authors of the report, the arrival of institutional investors and their interest in Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) has fundamentally shifted the cryptocurrency market landscape. Tokens with real world utility, Layer 2 technology or attractive staking ecosystems will outperform the large cap tokens from pre-2017. Bitcoin and Ethereum dominate but L2 tokens will catch up Institutional inflows firmly established Bitcoin and Ethereum as the chosen Layer 1 (L1) blockchains …