Gate Decentralized Finance Daily (, September 22, ): ASTER's explosive growth drives the PerpDEX sector; WLFI, UNI, AAVE, CRV fall over 7% in 24H.

On September 22, the crypto market struggled to break the "September curse" with an overall decline, and the total DeFi TVL fell below the $160 billion mark, dropping to approximately $156.617 billion, down about 3.03% in 24 hours. The daily trading volume on DEX is about $15.713 billion. PancakeSwap and Uniswap occupy the top two positions, while meteora remains active. Meanwhile, Aster (ASTER) has become a hotspot of attention in today's market, attracting significant interest from funds and the community. Mainstream tokens in the zone are generally under pressure, with WLFI, UNI, AAVE, CRV, and others showing significant declines.

Decentralized Finance Market Overview

(Source: DeFiLlama)

Total DeFi TVL across the network: The overall crypto market has fallen, and the "September curse" has reappeared; the total DeFi TVL across the network has fallen below the 160 billion USD mark, currently at 156.617 billion USD, down 3.03% in 24H.

DEX 24-hour volume: approximately 15.713 billion USD, with the top three being: PancakeSwap (3.568 billion USD), Uniswap (2.682 billion USD), Meteora (1.348 billion USD).

Popular Protocols and On-Chain Performance

Based on TVL, the data of the top ten DeFi protocols is as follows:

(Source: DeFiLlama)

Among them, the performance of the top-ranked protocol data is as follows:

Aave: TVL approximately $41.608 billion, daily decrease of 3.22%;

Lido: TVL approximately 36.711 billion USD, decreased by 4.08% in a single day;

EigenLayer: TVL approximately 18.016 billion USD, daily decrease of 5.54%;

Ethena: TVL approximately 14.201 billion USD, daily decrease of 0.09%;

Pendle: TVL approximately $12.961 billion, daily decrease of 1.95%.

In addition, the top ten projects ranked by protocol fees in the past 24 hours are as follows:

(Source: DeFiLlama)

Among them, Aave's protocol fees in the past 24 hours reached 3.51 million USD, ranking third after Tether and Circle; Uniswap ranked fourth with protocol fees of 3.16 million USD in the past 24 hours; Lido ranked fifth with 2.94 million USD.

Project News Summary

1. Falcon Finance officially announced on X the qualification results for the public sale of the FF Token, with a total of over 190,000 users passing the KYC certification of Buidlpad, and approximately 32.88 million USD being staked through the Buidlpad HODL activity. For all eligible users, the subscription window is open for only 1 day, and users must complete the subscription using USD1 before 10:00 UTC on September 23 (18:00 Beijing time).

2. Fragmetric officially announced on X that Fragmetric Labs and DeFi Development Corp (NASDAQ:DFDV) will launch the first Solana digital asset vault in South Korea through the acquisition of a publicly listed company in South Korea.

3. Arthur Hayes shared the analysis article "The Sword of Damocles of HYPE" and stated, "This is the reason for selling 96,600 HYPE today. But don't worry, a 126-fold increase is still possible, and 2028 is still a long way off." This morning, Arthur Hayes sold 96,600 HYPE, worth 5.1 million USD. Just three weeks ago, he predicted that the price of HYPE could rise 126 times in the coming years.

The analysis mentioned that HYPE is about to face its true test. Starting from November 29, 2025, 237.8 million HYPE Tokens will begin to be unlocked linearly over 24 months. Calculated at $50 per token, this amounts to $11.9 billion in team unlock value, with nearly $500 million worth of tokens entering the market each month. The analysis points out that the current repurchase capacity can only absorb about 17% of the unlocked tokens, leaving a surplus of approximately $410 million/month in token supply. The token unlock is a potential "sword of Damocles."

4. Vitalik Buterin stated in a post that for a long time, there has been a balancing issue within the Ethereum community between "economic sustainability" and "idealistic goals". Previously, high-yield opportunities were mainly found in NFTs, Meme coins, or high-risk DeFi, while applications that truly align with Ethereum's vision lacked sufficient economic support. Now, as various protocols mature and security improves, low-risk DeFi is becoming a core growth point for Ethereum, focusing on payments, savings, synthetic assets, and fully collateralized lending, offering considerable transaction fee contributions and inclusive value, capable of providing transparent, stable, and permissionless financial services to users globally.

This can be likened to "searching for Google": searching and advertising underpin Google's business model, while low-risk DeFi is expected to provide long-term, stable economic support for Ethereum. At the same time, it avoids speculation and cultural misalignment issues, which is highly consistent with the decentralized spirit of Ethereum.

On September 21, according to official data, the trading volume of the ASTERUSDT perpetual contract on mainstream CEX contract platforms (4.287 billion USD) surpassed the trading volume of the BTCUSDT perpetual contract (3.617 billion USD), currently ranking second in the volume leaderboard, with the ETHUSDT perpetual contract (6.001 billion USD) in first place.

6. According to monitoring by Lookonchain, a whale purchased 7.14 million ASTER (10.5 million USD) through 2 wallets (0x2204 and 0xAF37) in the past 3 days. This whale deposited 4.5 million USDT into Aster and then withdrew 7.14 million ASTER (10.5 million USD), currently holding 6 million USD in unrealized profits.

Overview of Major DeFi Projects in Various Ecosystems

Driven by the Aster craze, the 24-hour trading volume of BSC DEX surged to the top, reaching approximately $4.405 billion, with a weekly increase of 43.45%. The top three projects are:

PancakeSwap ($3.373 billion), Uniswap ($758.66 million), THENA ($8.859 million);

Solana DEX ranks second in 24-hour trading volume, approximately $3.861 billion, with the top three projects being:

Meteora ($1.348 billion), Raydium ($767.97 million), HumidiFi ($580.38 million);

Ethereum DEX has a 24-hour trading volume ranking third, at approximately $2.453 billion, with the top three projects being:

Uniswap ($1.165 billion), Fluid ($595.56 million), Pendle ($227.35 million).

Gate DeFi zone Token market data

According to the data from the Gate market page, the price performance of the top ten tokens in the Decentralized Finance zone is as follows:

(Source: Gate DeFi Sector Quotes)

As of September 22, the crypto market has seen a widespread fall, with a total liquidation of 1.7 billion dollars across the network in 24 hours, and the bears have suffered heavily; the DeFi zone tokens are also declining in unison, specifically:

WLFI is currently reported at 0.2157 USD, with a 24-hour fall of 7.66%;

UNI is currently reported at 8.15 dollars, with a 24-hour fall of 10.81%;

AAVE is currently priced at 265.35 USD, with a 24-hour fall of 10.6%;

MYX is currently reported at 9.58 USD, with a 24-hour fall of 0.27%;

INJ is currently reported at 12.43 USD, with a 24-hour fall of 10.21%;

CRV is currently reported at 0.6961 USD, with a 24-hour fall of 12.6%;

MORPHO is currently reported at 1.82 USD, with a 24-hour fall of 9.56%.

Market Trend Interpretation

Overall capital contraction: Leading protocols such as Aave, Lido, and EigenLayer have seen a decline of 3%~5% in TVL, indicating a decrease in market risk appetite and a short-term shift of funds towards defense.

Fee Structure Stability: Aave, Uniswap, and Lido continue to rank among the top protocols in terms of fees, indicating that core blue-chip protocols still maintain user activity and trading demand.

Changes in DEX Landscape: BSC and Solana ecosystem DEXs performed strongly, recording volumes of $4.405 billion and $3.861 billion respectively; among them, Meteora's volume is approaching Uniswap, highlighting the rapid expansion of liquidity on the Solana chain; notably, Aster has strongly sparked the PerpDEX craze, leading a new wave of investment trends, and tokens in the same zone have also seen varying degrees of increase.

Token market falls: Major DeFi Tokens such as WLFI, UNI, AAVE, and CRV generally experienced a daily decline of over 7%, reflecting the risk-averse sentiment of the secondary market towards the DeFi zone.

Analyst Opinions

ASTER is currently one of the strongest "narrative-driven points": Researchers believe that the rise in ASTER's price and the high leverage perpetual contract trading volume indicate that the market, in the current sluggish environment, is more easily attracted to emerging Tokens that have clear issuance, activities, and liquidity support.

Short-term Explosion vs Long-term Pressure: Analysts warn that the currency exchange and launch popularity of ASTER can bring short-term volume and liquidity, but its long-term performance will be constrained by factors such as unlocking releases and concentrated Token distribution. Some early holders face significant profit-taking pressure.

Safe-haven funds flow back to stable protocols: As the overall market sentiment weakens, leading protocols (such as Aave and Lido) have seen slight pullbacks, but are still regarded as lower-risk support points. Yield-generating projects (like Pendle and Ethena) still have the ability to attract capital, but macroeconomic and policy risks need to be taken into account.

Community Incentives and Token Mechanisms Become Core Competitiveness: The launch rewards, trading rewards, and token swap mechanisms of ASTER bring significant participation motivation to the market. In the future, if a project wants to gain sustained attention, it must not only have technology/TVL/income but also design attractive token economics and community participation mechanisms.