DeFi Token Performances

• Aave Lend: +1,200% YTD

• Synthetix Network: +250% YTD

• Chainlink: +225% YTD

• THORchain: +400% YTD

• Kava: +150% YTD 

• Tellor Tributes: +600% YTD 

• Kyber Network: +350% YTD 

• Loopring: +400% YTD

• Ren Protocol: +300% YTD

• Band Protocol: +1000% YTD

Recently created protocol tokens:

• COMP: +300%

• BZXR: +500%

• MTA: +200%

• BAL: +150%

To put it simply, DeFi is blowing up. Those who haven’t used DeFi think this is 2017 all over again but I’m here to debunk that statement. The difference between this hype cycle and the one in 2017 is how these tokens are distributed, traded, earned, and used. 

1.) The majority of DeFi tokens are earned by network participants rather than bought on secondary exchanges. This better aligns incentives for the community of token holders.

2.) DeFi tokens can be traded by anyone from anywhere thanks to smart contracts. Uniswap.exchange allows any frontend to incorporate DeFi participation. No KYC, no accredited investors only, if you have an Ethereum wallet with some Ether, you can participate.

3.) Liquidity Providers earn protocol tokens by staking or locking liquidity into a network or application through a smart contract. The return for doing so is quite high due to the inherent risks of participating in such early technology.

4.) Lastly, protocol tokens are often used to vote on future protocol changes. These votes can range in lending/borrowing rate changes to setting aside future cash flows for token holders.

As of right now there is over $2.7 billion locked up on the Ethereum blockchain alone, most of which is in the form of Ether (3.6 million Ether) and digital dollars. 

 

 

Ethereum has a total of 1959 apps with more than 4.5 million active users. These are mostly finance apps but some are gaming and social media platforms as well. According to https://etherscan.io/defi-leaderboard, there are 23 Ethereum dApps with at least $1 million locked in their smart contracts. 

 

A few things I’m looking for over the next year or so to determine long term viability of DeFi dApps for the general population.

-Better UI/UX

-Decentralized Oracle Solutions

-Proliferation of Legal DAOs (LAOs)

-Real world assets on-chain, USD was only the beginning

-More smart contract audit firms

Market Update (Monday 8:30 AM EST)

Percent Change (Rounded) Based on Last Monday Open (8:30 AM EST)

Bitcoin- $9,154 (-2%)

Ether- $238 (-2%)

Gold- $1,817 (+1%)

DJI Average- 26,660 (+2%)

NYSE Composite Index- 12,413 (+2%)

NASDAQ Composite Index- 10,526 (-2%)

S&P500 Index- 3,224 (+1%)

New Developments

1. Dozens of verified Twitter profiles hacked asking users to send Bitcoin to charity

2. Grayscale reports $906M Q2 inflows, Grayscale Digital Asset Investment Report

3. Diamonds have now been tokenized on Ethereum, CoinTelegraph

4. Ethereum 2.0 Economic Review, Tanner Hoban and Thomas Borgers

5. Announcing the Summer 2020 Batch of CoinList Seed Companies, CoinList

6. Teller raises $1M to bring credit scores to DeFi crypto loans, Decrypt

Industry Insights

• Collection of CBDC research and reports, Ashley Lannquist

• FinTech and Cryptocurrency report, Zabo

• Q2 Token Report, Bankless

• The Chainlink Fraud Exposed, Zeus Capital

• Ethereum has over 500,000 active addresses (wallets), Decrypt

For Developers

• Introduction to building on DeFi with Ethereum and USDC, Pete Kim

• Create your own private Ethereum Network, Go Ethereum

• See your frontend with your solidity code using Scaffold-eth, Austin Griffith

Blockchain Activity

Set up a custom Ethereum Network:

• Download Geth and Tools latest stable version from here

• Download MyCrytpo Wallet to your desktop here

• Unzip package in a folder you want to use, open terminal at that folder

• To start the process, use command:

  ./puppeth

• Set a network name like “blockchain” (no caps or punctuation) then control + c

• create a node1 keystore file (save password):

  ./geth account new --datadir node1

• create a node2 keystore file (save password):

  ./geth account new --datadir node2

• Follow the prompts: configure new genesis, create new genesis from scratch, Ethash - Proof of Work, prefund accounts created in Node1 and Node2 folders, no need to fund pre-compile addresses. Then control + c to exit prompt

• Initiate node1 and node2 with

  ./geth init blockchain.json --datadir node1 

  ./geth init blockchain.json --datadir node2

• Start mining on node1 with

  ./geth --datadir node1 --mine --miner.threads 1

• In new terminal start up node2 with the enode address from miner

  ./geth --datadir node2 --port 30304 --rpc --bootnodes enode://39550c46d9ee2e76210c031a3dd72270d6f1c0b26f288368a75e438e78b492c04cd7333e5e16bf4e[email protected]:30303

• Now you have a miner and a node on a custom Ethereum network!

   

Python Activity

Plotly Maps:

*Important to grab the Mapbox api key and set up an evironment to handle plotly

# import libraries and read in data

import plotly.express as px
import pandas as pd
import os
from pathlib import Path

# prep token for use

mapbox_token = os.getenv("MAPBOX_API_KEY")

px.set_mapbox_access_token(mapbox_token)

# prep data

df = pd.read_csv(Path("../Resources/population_counts.csv")).drop_duplicates()
data_to_plot = df[["Year", "PopulationCount", "Latitude", "Longitude"]]
filtered_data = df[df["StateDesc"] == "California"]

# plot data

px.scatter_mapbox(
    filtered_data,
    lat="Latitude",
    lon="Longitude",
    size="PopulationCount",
    color="CityName",
)

# scatter plot

px.scatter_mapbox(filtered_data, lat= "Latitude", lon= "Longitude", color="PopulationCount")

Earn Opportunity

Ever think about getting into mining cryptocurrency but don’t have the technical expertise to know where to start? No problem! Start mining with a Coinmine One in a few simple steps. Order the miner from the link above, take it out of the box, plug it into an outlet, download their app and connect using a unique ID number. It’s that easy! Coinmine allows users to pick between mining Ethereum, Zcash, Monero, Grin, and Handshake. To breakdown potential ROI; it takes about 3 months to mine 0.2 ETH, cost of the machine is about $700, while electricity consumption/cost is not even noticeable.