The Pomp Podcast
357: Yan Liberman on Liquidity and DeFi
- DeFi (decentralized finance) has grown significantly since March 2020, enabling borrowing, lending, and synthetic asset exposure without intermediaries or centralized gatekeepers.
- Liquidity pools and yield farming allow users to earn returns on idle assets by providing liquidity to protocols, though sustainability depends on which projects retain users after incentive rewards diminish.
- Token economics design determines whether new projects can bootstrap adoption and create sustainable value accrual for users rather than centralized companies.
- Bitcoin holders show strong accumulation signals: low on-chain movement, whales increasing holdings, and minimal exchange inflows—suggesting weak hands have largely exited.
- DeFi growth has driven Ethereum gas fees higher (sometimes $50+ per transaction) but pulled trading attention away from Bitcoin during low-volatility periods; both can coexist despite short-term correlation.
- Alt season historically requires Bitcoin volatility to remain muted; projects with real product-market fit and cash flows (like DeFi) are less momentum-driven than previous altcoin cycles.