DEFI JUST “LOST” $55B -- BUT THE MONEY DIDN’T ACTUALLY LEAVE.
CoinDesk reports DeFi TVL is down from $178B to $123B since October -- a scary-sounding $55B plunge. At first glance, it looks like users are fleeing the sector.
But zoom in:
➡️ $ETH is down ~38% in the same window.
➡️ Major DeFi tokens like $AAVE and $LDO are down 40–50%.
That means most of the “loss” is price depreciation, not people yanking capital.
The dollar value of locked assets fell because tokens got cheaper, not because wallets emptied.
Meanwhile:
✅ DeFi has been printing higher highs and higher lows in TVL since late 2023.
✅ Aave’s TVL is ~2x what it was a year ago.
✅ DEXs pushed ~$360B in volume between Nov 1–26, already beating June’s full month.
This isn’t 2021’s blow-off bubble. It’s a slower, sturdier build -- the kind that tends to last.
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