Synthetix

Synthetix nets $20M from Web3 quant trading firm

Derivatives liquidity protocol Synthetix seals a new partnership with DWF Labs, landing a $20 million investment from the quantitative trading firm.

Tokenized asset issuance platform Synthetix has secured a $20 million investment through a new partnership with Web3 investment and quantitative trading firm DWF Labs.

The market-making and algorithmic trading company acquired $15 million worth of Synthetix’s native token, Synthetix Network Token (SNX), paid for with USD Coin (USDC) in March 2023. DWF Labs will be tasked with increasing SNX token liquidity and market-making across centralized and decentralized exchanges.

Synthetix’s perpetual futures will be integrated into DWF Labs’ trading business as part of the deal. DWF Labs has also committed to purchase another $5 million worth of SNX once the integration of Synthetix’s services has been completed.

Synthetix allows users to tokenize a variety of real-world assets into derivatives called Synths, which provide exposure to a range of different assets. Holding SNX allows users to create Synths by locking tokens into a smart contract and minting Synths against the corresponding value.

Users can trade Synths using Synthetix’s pooled collateral model, with trades between Synths generating fees for SNX collateral providers.

The creation of on-chain synthetic assets tracks the value of real-world assets, which includes synthetic fiat currencies or commodities like gold and financial instruments like equity indexes.

DWF Labs managing partner Andrei Grachev highlighted the partnership’s provision of streamlined trading mechanisms in the decentralized finance space:

“By leveraging Synthetix’s deep liquidity and composability, platforms can now deliver better trades with lower slippage, allowing for innovative hedging strategies and unique use cases.”

Synthetix’s v2 platform surpassed $400 million in perpetual swap daily trade volume in March 2023, according to data from Dune Analytics.

Related: KuCoin leads $10M funding for Chinese yuan stablecoin issuer

The derivatives liquidity protocol saw a surge in daily fees in June 2022 after a collaboration with liquidity provider Curve Finance to create Curve pools for Synthetic Ether (sETH)/Ether (ETH), Synthetic Bitcoin (sBTC)/Bitcoin (BTC) and Synthetic U.S. dollar (sUSD)/3CRV.

The partnership allowed users to convert Synths like sETH to Ether (ETH) seamlessly and saw the SNX token value increase by over 100% during the depths of the prolonged cryptocurrency bear market.

What is CeDeFi, and why does it matter?

CeDeFi is a new financial system that combines centralized and decentralized systems. It provides privacy, reduced fees and ease of use.

What are the disadvantages of CeDeFi?

Currently, CeDeFi’s main downside is the high learning curve associated with its protocols because of their complexity. The concept is still young, and more intuitive and user-friendly interfaces are bound to emerge over time.

CeDeFi also relies heavily on Ethereum, given that most CeDeFi protocols are still built on the Ethereum blockchain. If Ethereum fails, CeDeFi will likely fail as well. However, this risk is mitigated by the fact that other blockchains are beginning to adopt CeDeFi protocols.

Another disadvantage of CeDeFi is that it’s still relatively new and unproven. While the sector has seen tremendous growth in the past year, it’s still in its early stages. As such, CeDeFi protocols are subject to high volatility and therefore may not yet be ready for mass adoption.

Finally, CeDeFi is not without its fair share of scams. Due to the lack of regulation, there have been several scams in the CeDeFi space. Therefore, it is essential to be vigilant, use only reputable CeDeFi protocols and view CeDeFi as a possible solution for integrating DeFi products and applications into mainstream financial systems.

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What are the advantages of CeDeFi?

Among the advantages of CeDeFi are lower fees, better security, accessibility, speed and lower cost.

CeDeFi’s innovative approach to decentralized banking enables users to trade CeDeFi crypto assets without requiring a centralized exchange. This implies that users may transact directly with one another, removing the need for an intermediary.

Among CeDeFi’s major advantages is lower fees. CeDeFi transactions cost lower than those on comparable platforms since there are fewer middlemen involved, especially on networks that are not Ethereum-based. 

Ethereum has very high gas fees, for instance, with DEX transactions running into hundreds of dollars. It also often causes network congestion issues, leading to delays. Binance CeDeFi, on the other hand, has much lower fees and accelerates transactions by allowing users to accept fees in a few seconds.

Another notable advantage is improved security. Hackers will find it far harder to break into the CeDeFi network than they will with traditional banking systems because of the network’s decentralized structure.

In addition, CeDeFi is incredibly accessible as anyone who has an Ethereum wallet can make use of the CeDeFi protocols. It lowers entry barriers for less experienced users and enables them to explore more about DeFi by presenting verified trade options vetted by multiple criteria, including KYC, fees and more.

Financial transactions conducted through CeDeFi can also be handled considerably faster than those performed through traditional financial systems. This is because CeDeFi doesn’t need to wait for approval from a third party, which can often take several days to weeks.

CeDeFi technologies are also more flexible than conventional financial systems, allowing them to be altered to meet the needs of each user. For instance, the automated yield portfolio (YAP) strategy by Midas diversifies portfolio risk by exposing investors to a variety of assets without the burden of buying separate crypto assets. Most significantly, YAPs go through monthly rebalancing at no extra expense to investors to maximize profits. 

By securing profits from better-performing assets while reinvesting in the underperforming assets, this rebalancing enables Midas to take advantage of market fluctuations in the hope of providing steady portfolio growth over the long term.

Furthermore, as projects and tokens are evaluated and audited thoroughly by CeDeFi exchanges, safer transactions are possible. CeDeFi provides more privacy than conventional payment systems because its decentralized network makes it harder for outside parties to track user transactions.

Who introduced CeDeFi to the crypto market?

Binance plays a huge part in the rise of CeDeFi — it was Binance’s CEO, Changpeng Zhao, who coined the term “CeDeFi,” in September 2020, during the launch of Binance Smart Chain.

Considering that Ethereum’s popularity is attributable to smart contracts functionality, Binance also realized it had to create another blockchain network to compete with Ethereum and its DeFi ecosystem. As a result, Binance rebranded its existing blockchain network to BNB Smart Chain, a fork of Ethereum with optimizations for low fees and high transaction throughput. 

While it sacrifices decentralization and censorship resistance — it still seems to be paying off. Although it was criticized by decentralization advocates, BNB Chain grew exponentially from September 2020, thanks to its ability to fund projects quickly, leading to the rise of CeDeFi.

In addition to Binance, investors can establish hedged yield streams through existing digital tactics using Midas’s hybrid CeDeFi investing platform for dependable passive income. Moreover, Midas claims to have a massive network of backend procedures in a volatile cryptocurrency market that seek to hedge and protect the front-end investment options offered to individuals.

Integration with a highly secure Fireblocks cryptocurrency custody and transfer technology has protected the Midas digital ecosystem. For stored custody assets, FireBlocks provides commercial-grade digital protection.

What is DeFi?

DeFi refers to a broad range of financial products and services built on blockchain technologies in the public blockchain space. It functions outside of traditional centralized systems like banks and credit cards.

These are accessible through decentralized applications (DApps), which operate on a peer-to-peer basis, removing the need for centralized authorities like banks, credit card companies or brokers. With DeFi, anyone can access alternative financial systems like lending and borrowing.

In CeFi, a centralized exchange handles all crypto trading, meaning users don’t have access to private keys or really own their crypto. They are also subject to the exchange’s terms and conditions, prices and gas fees.

In contrast, DeFi users have complete control of their funds since no centralized authority handles transactions. Instead, a blockchain-based protocol allows users to buy, sell, store and trade their funds as they please. Both DeFi and CeFi have their pros and cons. CeFi makes it easier to convert fiat to crypto, unlike DeFi. But DeFi is permissionless and does not require a KYC process.

What is CeFi?

CeFi is a structured financial institution that lets consumers borrow or lend cryptocurrency through a controlled exchange.

It functions similarly to the conventional banking industry. Users use their cryptocurrency as collateral when borrowing money or earn interest on it when lending. The CeFi platform serves as the “custodian” of your digital assets. You relinquish control of your cryptocurrency when the CeFi platform “safeguards” it to make money. If the platform is hacked, your assets could be at risk.

CeFi has a larger market share than DeFi because CeFi platforms are more widely used. Binance, Coinbase and Diem are among the popular CeFi platforms. However, due to CeFi’s expensive transaction fees brought on by third-party involvements, the lack of transparency and total ownership over your digital assets, DeFi became popular.

Do any CeDeFi protocols exist?

Some of the most popular examples of CeDeFi protocols include the MakerDAO, Synthetix and Compound, which offer DeFi-like capabilities while remaining centralized. A custodial crypto-investment platform like Midas.Investments is another example.

MakerDAO, Synthetix and Compound are all built on top of the Ethereum blockchain.  Midas.Investments updated its platform in August 2022 to incorporate CeDeFi strategies. According to the Midas team, the new approach aims to mirror DeFi by creating smart contracts to handle asset management under various lending protocols. These include lending, borrowing and soft leverage, ideally allowing an influx of capital into the DeFi space. 

As with many CeDeFi endeavors, Midas aims to provide its clients with DeFi options tailored to their risk profile while allowing access to hedged instruments from CeFi. To better understand CeDeFi, let’s first understand CeFi and DeFi.

What is CeDeFi?

CeDeFi is a union of CeFi and DeFi, combining the best features and attributes of the two financial systems.

For a while now, financial systems have been split into centralized finance (CeFi) and decentralized finance (DeFi). CeFi is a traditional, bank-enabled finance system, while DeFi is based on cryptocurrencies and smart contracts.

However, a new system, “CeDeFi,” a combination of centralized and decentralized finance, has emerged and is gaining traction. So, what is CeDeFi, and how does it work?

CeDeFi offers the same features as DeFi protocols while being centralized, allowing people to access DeFi products like decentralized exchanges (DEXs), liquidity aggregators, yield farming tools and lending protocols — yet still leveraging the advantages of CeFi systems.

Unlike DeFi, which is permissionless and available for use by anyone, CeDeFi projects lean more toward centralization. They are often governed by a single or small group of entities, which allows them more control (similar to a CeFi).

Overall, the CeDeFi ecosystem, which is a hybrid of the centralized and decentralized models, aims to improve the traditional cryptocurrency model to allow for faster transactions, improved security, a larger transaction volume and comparatively lower fees than traditional systems.

DeFi’s downturn deepens, but protocols with revenue and fee sharing could thrive

It’s too early to know if DeFi is “dead,” but platforms that share revenue with liquidity providers and token holders could be the ones that survive the bear market.

At the moment, liquidity is hard to come by, but crypto traders and protocols still need inflow and revenue to remain functional.

As the crypto winter drags on, savvy crypto investors have realized that one of the reliable sources of passive income that still exists can be found on protocols that generate revenue and share some of it with their respective communities.

Let’s take a look at some of the protocols that continue to thrive in the current down market.

DeFi might be dead, but platforms with revenue will thrive

Data from Token Terminal shows revenue positive platforms are primarily the nonfungible token (NFT) marketplaces like LooksRare and OpenSea.

Top dapps based on cumulative protocol revenue in the past 180 days. Source: Token Terminal

Aside from a few select protocols including MetaMask, Decentral Games, Axie Infinity and Ethereum Name Service, the majority of the remaining protocols with the highest revenue are decentralized finance platforms, showing that while DeFi is down, it’s not out of the game.

Fee sharing helps to lure liquidity

DeFi protocols and decentralized applications (DApps) that offer fee sharing to token holders and liquidity providers are also revenue positive.

As the bear market continues to batter prices and eliminate unprofitable and poorly managed platforms, protocols that offer token holders passive income streams have a higher chance of enduring until the next bull market begins.

Related: DeFi Summer 3.0? Uniswap overtakes Ethereum on fees, DeFi outperforms

Synthetix (SNX) makes a comeback

A good example of how fee sharing can help boost a token and DeFi protocol was recently seen with Synthetix (SNX), which made waves when it partnered with Curve Finance to create Curve pools for several of its Synths assets.

Since the cross-chain collaboration was established, the protocol revenue for Synthetix has seen a tremendous increase that coincided with a rise in the price of SNX from $1.56 to its current price at $2.59.

SNX daily price vs. protocol revenue in the past 180 days. Source: Token Terminal

The increase in revenue did not go unnoticed by crypto Twitter, which was quick to point out the rapid turnaround for the platform.

How it all plays out for Synthetix in the long run, is anyone’s guess. For now, the platform is demonstrating that generating revenue and sharing some of that revenue with token holders is one way to retain market share during a market downturn. 

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