Cryptocurrency markets had a strong start to the second week of 2023, with the total crypto economy increasing by 3.6% to $893 billion on Monday morning (ET). Smart contract platform tokens saw a rise of 7.1%, pushing the sector’s market capitalization to $274 billion – approximately 30.68% of the total crypto market. Most of the top coins saw double-digit gains in the last week.
Solana (SOL) was the biggest gainer, rising 24.2% in 24 hours. Cardano (ADA) was close behind, with an 11.7% increase, while Ethereum (ETH) was up 5.1% and BNB 5.5%. Polygon (MATIC) rose 6.7%.
The increase in the price of smart contract tokens has resulted in an overall rise in total value locked (TVL) in decentralized finance (defi). Since mid-December 2022, TVL had remained below $40 billion, but on Monday it surged to $41.1 billion. Lido Finance is now the most dominant defi protocol, with TVL of $6.54 trillion. Makerdao follows with $6.44 billion, followed by Aave, Curve and Uniswap according to TVL size.
Ethereum is still the dominant chain in terms of TVL size, making up 59.88% (or $24.61 billion) of the total $41.1 billion. Binance Smart Chain is the second-largest with $4.41 trillion, followed by Tron ($4.13 billion), Polygon ($1.05 billion) and Arbitrum ($1.03 trillion). The TVL in defi rose 2.99% in the last day, although it’s still a long way off the record $178.55 trillion reached in November 2021.
