defi

On October 9, the decentralized stablecoin USDD sponsored and attended the Cointelegraph CONNECT event held in Singapore. USDD's Head of Communication Yvonne Chia will participate in a thematic discussion alongside executives from projects such as ether.fi, Mercuryo, and FinHarbor. This discussion focuses on how stablecoins can truly enter daily consumption scenarios through payment infrastructures like cards and wallets.USDD is a multi-chain decentralized over-collateralized stablecoin, currently issued simultaneously on the TRON network, Ethereum Chain, and BNB Chain. Leveraging its seamless compatibility with major DeFi protocols and multi-chain layout advantages, USDD is committed to building a secure, transparent, and efficient decentralized stablecoin product, while continuously exploring the greater value of stablecoins in the real economy.

Blockworks analyst Jake Koch-Gallup published a rebuttal to the viewpoint that Ethereum is losing its liquidity moat, arguing that despite the challenges to ETH's value capture ability and stablecoin market share, its reserve asset characteristics, Layer 2 ecosystem, and institutional adoption still constitute a long-term competitive advantage.In response to the issue of low on-chain revenue for Ethereum, Jake pointed out that ETH's valuation depends not only on actual economic value (REV) but also includes reserve asset and collateral premiums, with ETH's market capitalization currently about 1,100 times the REV of the past 12 months. Additionally, the development of Layer 2 networks such as Robinhood Chain and Base can still strengthen the Ethereum ecosystem, rather than indicating that funds and applications are completely leaving Ethereum. Jake also noted that Ethereum currently accounts for about 65% of the total value locked (TVL) in DeFi, with approximately 45% of the on-chain managed scale in real-world assets (RWA), while spot ETFs and corporate treasuries collectively hold about 13% of the total ETH supply, and about 36% of the ETH supply is currently staked.Although Ethereum's stablecoin market share has gradually faced dilution pressure from around 51%, Jake believes that as the overall stablecoin market expands, its absolute scale may continue to grow. However, Jake also acknowledged that relying solely on ETH's reserve asset premium, without sufficient revenue and value return mechanisms, raises questions about its valuation sustainability.

Robinhood Chain's on-chain activity continues to cool down. According to CoinDesk's calculations based on growthepie data, from October 2 to 8, the network's average daily transaction volume was 6.2 million, a decrease of 42% compared to 10.8 million from September 10 to 16, and a drop of 20% from the previous week; during the same period, the average daily active addresses were about 322,000, down 31% from mid-September. Robinhood launched this chain in July, allowing users to trade tokens and lend through applications connected to Ethereum, and plans to introduce around-the-clock trading of tokens linked to stocks and funds.Transaction volume has also declined. From October 2 to 8, the spot trading volume fell to $7.45 billion, down 21% from the previous week's $9.46 billion, with Uniswap handling about 77% of it. However, funds have not fled; on-chain lending and trading application deposits increased by about 2% week-over-week to $1.04 billion, and the supply of stablecoins rose to about $1.1 billion. Perpetual contract trading volume, on the other hand, grew against the trend by 26% to about $7.35 billion.Fee income has shrunk accordingly. During that week, users paid an average of about $65,000 in network fees daily, a decrease of 39% from the previous week, far below the peak of $8 million per day at the beginning of September. According to a report by Bernstein last month, Robinhood retains about 90% of network fees.

TRON DeFi Summer S3 is ongoing, and JST, as the governance token of JUST and JustLend DAO, is opening new on-chain revenue opportunities for holders. Users can access JustLend DAO through Binance Wallet DeFi and participate in the $300,000 JST Boost reward pool. By depositing 1000+ JST, users can join the S3 event and enjoy Boost incentives. Holding JST not only allows participation in protocol governance and community voting but also enables additional earnings in S3, releasing dual value from the governance token. The real-time APR fluctuates with market conditions and is subject to the final display on the event page.

The U.S. Congressional Budget Office estimates that the total federal budget deficit for fiscal year 2026 will be $2 trillion, an increase of $218 billion from fiscal year 2025.Revenue is expected to increase by $169 billion, while spending is projected to rise by approximately $386 billion, with the increase in spending primarily coming from net interest on debt, welfare programs, defense, and education.

According to The Defiant, a wallet address transferred 150 million USDT from the lending protocol Aave to Spark Savings.This fund transfer occurred as Aave's borrowing rates rose to double-digit levels. Affected by withdrawals, on October 8, Aave's USDT reserves available liquidity on Ethereum amounted to 169.54 million dollars.

South Korean Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Strategy and Finance Lee Hyung-ryul stated that in response to the virtual asset taxation policy planned for implementation in 2027, various opinions proposed by the National Assembly, as well as those from experts, industry professionals, and relevant stakeholders, will be widely collected.South Korean lawmaker Kim Sang-hoon questioned that several months before the implementation of virtual asset taxation, the relevant infrastructure is still not complete, including insufficient tracking and verification capabilities for trading records on overseas exchanges, DEX, DeFi, and other platforms. Regarding the expected tax scale brought by virtual asset taxation, Lee Hyung-ryul stated that there are indeed parts that are "difficult to accurately grasp." Since taxation requires obtaining taxpayer declaration data first, further tax estimation can only be conducted after the relevant declaration system is launched next year, and related policies will be carefully evaluated.

According to official news, Chainlink announced the launch of CCIP Vault Adapters, allowing decentralized finance (DeFi) vaults on a single network to directly receive one-click deposits from over 80 supported blockchains, without the need to redeploy vaults across different chains.

On October 7, TRON DeFi Summer S3 continues, providing more on-chain yield options for stable asset holders. As a stablecoin in the TRON ecosystem, USDD users can access JustLend DAO through Binance Wallet DeFi and participate in the $600,000 USDD Boost reward pool.Holding 100 USDD allows participation in the S3 event, earning basic annualized returns while stacking Boost incentives. Users can exchange USDT for USDD at a 1:1 ratio with zero slippage through PSM, and the deposited USDD can continue to serve as qualified collateral, balancing yield and capital flexibility. The real-time APR may vary with market changes; please refer to the activity page for the latest information.

On September 29, the Orca community released a token holder proposal to adjust the protocol fee distribution to 10% flowing into the xORCA pool, 10% allocated to the team's buyback account, and 80% for team operations. The proposal also plans to transfer approximately 14.2 million ORCA from the community treasury and about 70,000 SOL from the fee treasury to a team-controlled account, and to dissolve the council, shifting to pure token holder governance.The original distribution was 20% xORCA, 30% fee treasury, and 50% team, later adjusted to 40% / 10% / 50%. The team stated that they have negotiated the acquisition of a leading Solana DeFi protocol, which is expected to bring about a 50% increase in TVL. Voting requires 3 million yes votes, with a voting period of 5 days, and the council can veto with 4 votes. Risks include concentration of control and reduced xORCA yields, with the team committing to disclose buyback and strategic account deployment status every six months.

The decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol Sky Protocol has been granted a B3 long-term counterparty risk rating by the credit rating agency Moody's, with a stable outlook. This is the first time Moody's has rated a stablecoin protocol.As of September, Sky Protocol holds approximately $90 million in tangible common equity, corresponding to about $10 billion in tangible managed assets. Moody's describes its capital position as a "significant credit weakness." Sky Protocol, formerly known as MakerDAO, is responsible for managing the USDS and DAI, which are pegged to the US dollar. Moody's noted that approximately 45% to 50% of Sky Protocol's assets consist of stablecoins and tokenized money market funds, with another approximately 25% in cryptocurrency collateralized loans. Its rating is also constrained by low capital adequacy ratios, confidence-sensitive stablecoin liabilities, and risks associated with the DAO structure.

Kaiko and Upbit recently jointly released a report showing that the Korean won accounts for about 25% of the global fiat-denominated cryptocurrency trading volume, second only to the US dollar (approximately 48.70%). On Upbit, a market buy order of 10 million Korean won typically has slippage between 0.005% and 0.02%.The report points out that the South Korean market still primarily relies on fiat-native trading, with KRW trading pairs dominating trading activities. Stablecoins like USDT and USDC are more often used as assets traded against the Korean won rather than as the primary settlement medium. South Korean exchanges are deeply integrated with the banking system through real-name accounts and KYC, allowing users to directly withdraw and deposit in Korean won, reducing the demand for stablecoins as tools for withdrawal and deposit.The report believes that the opportunities for Korean won stablecoins lie in on-chain settlement, cross-border payments, and DeFi scenarios, and may help narrow premiums by improving the efficiency of value transfer across markets. However, adoption still depends on regulations, reserve standards, redemption rights, and exchange integration.

The decentralized exchange Orca based on Solana has announced a merger with the lending platform Loopscale, with the new entity named Formation. After the merger, the team will be led by Loopscale co-founder Luke Truitt as CEO. Formation plans to combine Orca's trading infrastructure with Loopscale's lending and investment vaults to provide a one-stop path for emerging assets from issuance, financing to trading.The company aims to extend from crypto trading and lending into capital-intensive fields such as AI, energy, robotics, and defense. Truitt stated that the pace at which the frontier economy creates new business models and financing demands is faster than the evolution of traditional market infrastructure. Formation claims that traditional financing is too costly for smaller-scale transactions and plans to reduce costs and eventually connect to regulated U.S. capital markets. In the coming year, Formation will launch tools and new investment strategies aimed at asset issuers and has already partnered with Figure, Shinhan Asset Management, Superstate, R3, and Securitize to promote asset tokenization and distribution.Christopher Montagano from Orca will serve as Formation's Chief Strategy and Legal Officer, stating that mere liquidity is not enough to scale assets. Both parties confirmed that the existing agreements will still form the basis for the ORCA and xORCA token networks, and the financial terms of the merger have not been disclosed.

Lido announced the launch of the lending protocol Lido Lend, which is built on a modified fork of Morpho Blue and is planned to go live in the fourth quarter of 2026. Lido stated that the platform is aimed at long-term passive investors, with the goal of enhancing returns while controlling risks. Lido is a decentralized liquid staking protocol on Ethereum that issues stETH.Lido Lend has three core designs: first, an isolated market structure where each lending market operates independently, so issues in a single market do not affect others; second, a deposit screening mechanism to prevent bad collateral and funds that have been hacked from entering the system; third, a reliable lender exit mechanism, allowing lenders to smoothly redeem their funds even when the market reaches full utilization.The market will focus on low-volatility blue-chip asset trading pairs, such as stETH/ETH. The protocol is intended to be governed by Lido DAO, but the relevant governance arrangements have not yet been finalized and will await future DAO votes. Morpho Blue was launched in 2024, supporting users in creating isolated markets with specific collateral and lending parameters through a simple, immutable framework.

According to PRNewswire, the publicly traded company Universal Safety Products (UUU) announced that it will be renamed DeFi Capital Markets on October 19 and will trade under the new ticker "DCM." In the future, it will gradually cease its original product business and focus on asset tokenization, digital assets, market making, as well as quantitative trading and blockchain financial markets.

Moody's has assigned a B3 rating to the decentralized finance protocol Sky, with a stable outlook. This rating places Sky in Moody's speculative grade category.Moody's noted that Sky's capital buffer is relatively weak, with equity capital of approximately 90 million dollars, while the assets under management are about 10 billion dollars.

Tether announced the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the National Bank of Kazakhstan (NBK) and the Almaty City Administration (ACA), where the three parties will explore cooperation opportunities in areas such as stablecoin applications, asset tokenization, and decentralized finance.

On October 6, TRON DeFi Summer S3 is ongoing, and TRX holders are welcomed with a new round of on-chain earning opportunities. Users can enter JustLend DAO through Binance Wallet DeFi to participate in the $1 million TRX Boost reward pool.From TRX to sTRX, users can earn basic rewards by staking TRX, and also stack additional Boost incentives from the S3 event. By simply depositing 500+ TRX through Binance Wallet, users can explore more DeFi gameplay. This S3 total reward pool is $2 million and will last for 60 days. The real-time APR may vary with market changes; please refer to the activity page for the latest information.