Category Archive

Investment Thesis Out of the numerous tokenomic designs that emerged (and failed) last cycle, the vote-escrowed model proved objectively most ‘feasible’, as evidenced by Curve’s dominant position in TVL amongst DEXs. Control over a protocol’s gauge emissions made sense to many, assigning real value to governance tokens. The second-order expectations that liquidity would follow did as well. However, maximizing yield …

Since the Beacon Chain launch in Dec 2020, Ethereum users could stake bundles of 32 ETH to secure the network in exchange for priority fee rewards. While these staked ETH[1] are ‘productive,’ many have opted against staking given its operational complexity and illiquidity. Liquid staking projects solve for this by managing validator uptime and offering liquid staking derivatives (LSDs) to …

Introduction Founded by Stani Kuchelov, Aave (formerly LEND) is the largest DeFi lending market by TVL (~$8b across v2 and v3) and the fifth largest dApp overall. The protocol is currently live across five networks and 11 markets, hosting more than 30 assets across its platform. In July ‘22, Aave announced that they are launching their native stablecoin, $GHO, in …

Fundstrat’s recently launched Crypto Core Strategy offers subscribers a digestible tool to manage their crypto portfolio, with the goal of outperforming bitcoin. For those looking to amplify the returns of their long positions, this complementary issue of DeFi Digest strives to cast light on some of the best risk-adjusted yields. We first describe our methodology to filter for yield opportunities, …

Introduction & Context 2021 saw the rise of numerous VC-backed Layer 1s, the most prominent of which includes Solana, Luna, and Avalanche, known to many in the fold as ‘SoLunAvax.’ Their meteoric rise was partially attributable to the large ecosystem funds deployed [1] [2] [3] and the incessant marketing by large venture capitalists and their counterparts. Fast forward to 2023, …

Tokenomics (a portmanteau for token and economics) represents the monetary policy of tokens that directly contributes to their price fluctuations. In bull markets, tokenomics were given utmost priority, sometimes constituting full theses for investment decisions. When the euphoria wears off in the bear, however, founders and market participants are left realizing that tokenomics can delay a weak project’s demise, but …

Introduction and Opportunity In the last issue of DeFi Digest, we dove into decentralized options, a ‘Zero-to-One’ primitive that can onboard the next wave of DeFi users. Perhaps long overdue, this week we dive into decentralized perpetual futures, an instrument native to the digital asset space. A regular futures contract is simply a contractual legal agreement to buy or sell …

Introduction and Opportunity Options are one of the most popular derivatives in traditional markets among institutional and retail investors. Due to their versatility, traders use options to hedge existing positions, speculate on a security’s directional moves, or generate income. In 2021 alone, 33.3b options contracts were traded, up 35% from 2020. Much of this growth can be attributed to retail …

Zero-to-One (Z2O) Series Given the decentralization and transparency benefits of blockchains, many have pointed to DeFi as crypto’s ‘killer use case.’ After all, finance today is built along opaque and slower traditional finance rails ripe for disruption by distributed ledger technology. Sobering up from the highs of the bull market of ‘21, however, DeFi advocates are now left wondering: ‘How …