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This Week In DeFi – November 17

This Week In DeFi – November 17

Alex Miguel
November 17, 2023

Happy Friday, DeFi readers!

This week…

Uniswap releases app for Android
dYdX Chain officially launches in beta
Spark Protocol reaches $1B TVL
Pyth Network announces claim date for airdrop

Uniswap releases app for Android

Uniswap Labs has publicly released its Android app, following a successful beta testing phase. The app, available through the Google Play store, allows users to make swaps via built-in access to its decentralized exchange – eliminating the need for a separate browser extension.

The news comes as Uniswap’s new front-end fees rake in a cumulative $1 million to date, in the span of less than a month. The additional 0.15% fee was introduced in mid-October and applies to the web interface and wallet app transactions.

Say hello to Uniswap on Android.
— Uniswap Labs 🦄 (@Uniswap)
3:04 PM • Nov 14, 2023

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dYdX Chain launches in beta

dYdX has launched its Cosmos appchain in beta mainnet, opening the doors for trading across 33 different markets.

Validators and stakers will be able to earn trading fees during this phase, however no trading rewards will be available during the beta testing phase.

The DYDX token has seen a significant price increase over the last week, despite $500 million worth of the tokens being set to be unlocked for investors next month.

dYdX has also partnered with Circle for easier USDC transfers to dYdX chain via Circle’s Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol, set to go live on Cosmos-native chain, Noble, November 28.

dYdX Chain = all fees to #dydx stakers
— Charles d'Haussy | dYdX (@charlesdhaussy)
9:27 PM • Nov 14, 2023

Spark Protocol reaches $1B TVL

DAI-focused lending protocol, Spark, has reached a milestone of $1 billion in total value locked (TVL), now ranking as the 16th-largest DeFi protocol.

Its growth has been driven by increased yields via the Dai Savings Rate (DSR), as well as the prospect of a Spark airdrop in the future.

Spark’s debt ceiling is set to be increased by 100% this week, from $400 million to $800 million.

Spark's total value locked has exceeded $1 billion.
→ defillama.com/protocol/spark
— Maker (@MakerDAO)
6:31 PM • Nov 13, 2023

Pyth Network announces claim date for airdrop

Oracle provider Pyth Network has finally set a date for its airdrop, with 255 million tokens to be claimable on November 20, at 14:00 UTC.

90,000 wallets are eligible for the airdrop, following a broadening of eligibility criteria last week.

Eligible users will have 90 days to claim their PYTH token allocation, with several exchanges such as OKX and HTX already announcing that they will list the asset.

.@okx is a strategic contributor to Pyth Network as a data provider and ecosystem participant.
They have announced the direct listing of PYTH Tokens.
Eligible airdrop claimants can refer to OKX's official announcements and social channels for more details on the listing and the… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
— Pyth Network 🔮 (@PythNetwork)
1:59 PM • Nov 16, 2023

Layer-2s Continue to Multiply…

It may seem as though every man and his dog is currently creating a new Layer-2 scaling network, and that would be because…it’s simply true.

Former “Ethereum competitor” Layer-1s have transitioned into scaling platforms for the very network they planned to destroy, while other completely new projects are sprouting to capture their share of the hype.

It does make sense, after all, to provide the every day user with a platform that is affordable to transact with. Rather than trying to survive amongst the whales.

Although there was a significant period of time with low transaction fees during the bear market, we are suddenly being faced once again with a near-instant acceleration in Ethereum gas prices that seem to price out the average Joe – and it will only get worse with more adoption.

As these Layer-2 solutions gain popularity, we are led to two key problems:

Centralization
Fragmentation

Each Layer-2 network forgoes a certain level of decentralization and/or security as its “price” to pay for improvements to security and speed. Each type of scaling platform has its own ways to overcome this tradeoff, or hedge against it, however we may be likely to witness our first instances of exploits or fraudulent proofs as the honeypot grows bigger.

The second problem of fragmentation may see the TVL “pie” get chopped up into smaller and smaller slices, as the number of available scaling platforms increase. This will likely mimic the rotation of capital around Layer-1 blockchains that we saw during the last bull-run, as incentive programs pop-up on each Layer-2 alternative. Capital may flow continuously to the “next best thing” before we see users pick their favorite platform based on its true merits.

Bridges between L2s exist, however we are likely to see capital eventually aggregate on the most efficient network.

Overall, it feels a lot like the Layer-1 rotation of yesteryear. But which will be the eventual winners of the L2 race?