Demex Daily #3: $MKR MakerDAO Soars After Adjusting Lending Rates

Top Gainer — MakerDAO (MKR)

Today’s outperformer is MKR, which rose 12.6% in the past 24 hours after the platform adjusted its lending rates.

MakerDAO (MKR), launched in December 2017, is a decentralized lending platform on Ethereum that uses its stablecoin, Dai, for loans. Users deposit Ethereum to receive Dai loans, with the amount dependent on the asset's value. If the asset's value drops, users must repay the loan and a fee to reclaim their collateral. If the asset appreciates, they can borrow more Dai. Today, MKR surged more than 10%, outperforming the broader crypto market's 3.5% decline. The uptick is attributed to MakerDAO's return to profitability after adjusting its lending rates. MakerDAO, one of the largest crypto lending platforms, had temporarily increased rewards to DAI holders, which affected its profitability. After lowering these rewards and raising borrowing rates, the platform became profitable again. This profitability benefits MKR holders through a token buyback scheme introduced last month. Additionally, Maker's associated lending platform, Spark, saw its total value locked (TVL) nearing an all-time high of $700 million.

What's Interesting Today:

Swift, in collaboration with Chainlink and over ten major financial institutions including Citi Bank, BNY Mellon, and BNP Paribas, successfully conducted tests to move tokenized financial assets across both traditional and blockchain networks. Utilizing Chainlink's oracle services, the experiments connected to Sepolia, an Ethereum testnet, and employed Swift's newly launched Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP). The tests demonstrated that Swift could serve as a centralized connectivity point for transferring tokenized assets across various blockchains, supporting the growing trend toward tokenization in financial markets.