Analyzing the activity on lending platforms can sometimes be used as a barometer for measuring the sentiment of the cryptocurrency market as a higher number of collateral-backed loans may signal that traders are eager to trade a rising market. The month of April saw the total value locked on Maker (MKR), Aave (AAVE) and Compound (COMP) climb to new highs alongside rising token values and trading volumes. All three of the projects are based on the Ethereum (ETH) network and have benefited from the rising price of ETH as well as a recent decline in the average gas fee that …

Bitcoin’s (BTC) price closed the month down 1.98%, which, according to data from Bybit, was its first negative close in April since 2015. In the same month, Ether’s (ETH) price soared over 44% to hit a new all-time high close to $3,000. This wide divergence between the top two cryptocurrencies shows that the markets have matured and Bitcoin’s underperformance is not affecting altcoins as much as it did in the past. Ether’s bullish trend has attracted strong buying from traders. Data from Bybit suggests that Ether futures open interest climbed to $8.5 billion on Thursday, rising 52% over the previous …

On April 29 Ether's (ETH) price rose to another all-time high, boosting its market capitalization to over $320 billion. With the recent rally, Ether’s market cap has overtaken platinum and PayPal to become the 32nd most valuable asset in the world, according to data from CompaniesMarketCap. Ether’s market dominance has risen from 10.79% at the start of the year to 15.4% currently, whereas Bitcoin’s (BTC) market cap has dropped from over 70% to 48.2% during the same period. To cater to the growing popularity of Ether, asset manager WisdomTree launched a physically-backed Ether exchange-traded product on Borse Xetra and Swiss …

Aave has launched liquidity mining incentives for its v2 protocol, paying out governance token rewards exceeding 20% to users who borrow stablecoins. At the time of writing, users who deposit stablecoins into the protocol can earn an additional yield of between 4.78% and 13.49% on top of their regular gains in the form of staked Aave (stkAAVE) tokens. Wrapped Bitcoin (wBTC) deposits are also paying an extra 4.59%, while Ether (ETH) deposits are garnering 2.11% in rewards. However, the highest rewards appear to be going to stablecoin borrowers, who are currently receiving rewards of between 5.15% and 22.05% AIP-16 received …

With a liquidity mining program set to launch on Monday, Aave could be on the cusp of becoming the dominant decentralized finance (DeFi) ledning protocol. Earlier today, Aave Improvement Proposal (AIP) 16 reached quorum, meaning that starting on Monday, 4/26 liquidity providers and borrowers in Aave’s USDC, DAI, USDT, GUSD, ETH, and WBTC pools will earn stAAVE rewards in addition to their standard interest yield. Per AIP 16, providers and borrowers in these pools will split 2,200 stAAVE tokens per day from the protocol’s current 2.9 million AAVE Ecosystem Reserve, currently worth nearly $1 billion. The proposal, written by Aave …

Loyal Finance Redefined readers: Hi, I’m Andrew. My inestimable colleague Andrey, the previous compiler of this newsletter, is stepping away from Cointelegraph in order to build [REDACTED], leaving me to take over lettering the news. While I’m thrilled he’ll be keeping around the DeFi ecosystem, I’m also infuriated that there’ll be yet another gigabrain trading against me. Also: journalists quitting their jobs to do DeFi stuff. Talk about top signals. While DeFi tokens and ETH prices in particular have largely rebounded from dispepsia-inducing lows, I remain antsy. Nonetheless, the highlights of the week: 4/20 Haze It In the 4/21 hangover …

As cripplingly high gas fees put scalability in the spotlight and multiple platforms rush to become the preferred home of Ethereum’s decentralized finance, or DeFi, ecosystem, layer-two sidechain Polygon may be emerging as a frontrunner after scoring two big wins today. Both lending protocol Aave and portfolio management and batched transaction platform Zapper have announced that they will be offering implementations on Polygon. Aave will be launching a trimmed-down fork of its money market, with seven assets available for borrowing and lending at launch, and Zapper will enable Ethereum-to-Polygon transfers in the first step toward enabling cross-chain “zaps” — its …

Decentralized finance (DeFi) was the driving force behind the growth in the cryptocurrency market in early 2021, but lately, the sector has taken a back seat to nonfungible tokens as famous artists and legacy auction houses jump into the NFT ring. A break from the spotlight has allowed some of the more popular DeFi projects like Balancer to regroup and plan out the next steps for their protocols as they work toward creating a more interoperable, user-friendly DeFi ecosystem. Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView shows that Balancer Protocol Governance Token (BAL) reached a low of $28.95 on Feb. 23 …

Nonfungible tokens (NFTs) have rapidly become the new hot topic in the cryptocurrency sector, as evidenced by Litecoin (LTC) creator Charlie Lee comparing the current spike in NFT interest to the ICO mania of 2017. The recent pullback in the cryptocurrency market hit decentralized finance tokens (DeFi) pretty hard, but as Bitcoin's (BTC) price recovered the $50,000, DeFi and NFT tokens bounced back rapidly. One project that has successfully capitalized on the DeFi and NFT boom is Aavegotchi. The project benefits from its association with Aave, while also focusing on the creation of value-infused NFTs that are limited in minting. …

After a string of delays related to congestion on the Ethereum blockchain, the Aavegotchi nonfungible tokens have hit the open market — where they stayed for not even a full minute, the team reported to Cointelegraph. The Aavegotchi project attempts to create digital collectibles with real value backing them through an integration with Aave and its aTokens, interest-bearing representations of funds supplied to the decentralized finance protocol. While the Aavegotchis are designed to incorporate some gaming and collection elements to them, inspired by the handheld Tamagotchi devices popular in the late 1990s and early 2000s, they are also an experiment …

The Purpose Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded fund debuted on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Feb. 18 and has quickly ramped up trading volumes of about $400 million worth of shares in two days. This is quite impressive, considering that the equity market in Canada is only a fraction of the size of the U.S. markets. This shows strong demand for Bitcoin and investor's preference to take the ETF route to establish fresh positions. Last week, Bitcoin reached another important milestone when it hit the critical $1 trillion market capitalization on Feb. 19, making it the sixth asset on the list of …

Some of DeFi’s biggest players have joined forces to launch a new alliance geared towards furthering the education, research and best practices of the nascent industry. The GoodFi alliance, launched by Radix, includes crypto projects Chainlink, Aave, and mStable, as well as digital analytics company Messari. Piers Ridyard, CEO at Radix, told Cointelegraph that GoodFi “enables companies operating in the DeFi space to collectively work to solve the issues facing a wider base, starting with the generally “crypto-engaged” but building to a mainstream audience.” As members of GoodFi, companies can share strategies and communal knowledge for attracting new DeFi users. …