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CoinDesk Podcast Network

UNCHAINED: Ethena’s USDe Grew to $2 Billion in 7 Weeks. Is It Safe?

CoinDesk Podcast Network

CoinDesk

Business News, Daily News, News, Tech News

4.7698 Ratings

🗓️ 5 April 2024

⏱️ 41 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Ethena's synthetic dollar, USDe, hit a $2 billion market cap in just seven weeks, raising eyebrows. Ethena Labs founder Guy Young explores the risks of reinventing the digital dollar. Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Fountain, Overcast, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform. This week, Ethena was in the spotlight after the airdrop of ENA, its new governance token. Ethena’s flagship product, the “synthetic dollar” USDe has amassed a $2 billion market cap in less than two months. Meanwhile, ENA’s market capitalization sits around $1.4 billion, with a fully diluted valuation of $15.5 billion.  In this episode, Guy Young, founder of Ethena Labs, discusses the risks associated with Ethena, including custodial risks and counterparty risks to exchanges. Young also talks about the use cases of Ethena's governance token, and discusses the potential for Ethena to be integrated with DeFi and CeFi. Show highlights: An introduction to what Ethena is and how USDe works Why the team doesn't want to refer to USDe as a stablecoin and prefers to use the term "synthetic dollar" What the risks of USDe are, including custody, counterparties, and smart contracts Why Guy is "pleased" with how the ENA airdrop went through How ENA will be used and what its role will be in the governance of Ethena Why Ethena is now onboarding Bitcoin as collateral Why Guy thinks that there's been an "exaggeration" regarding the situation with Maker and Aave Guy's response to the critics who say that Ethena is essentially Terra/Luna Whether USDe would only work in a bull market How the Ethena insurance fund works and what it aims to accomplish What's next for Ethena after onboarding Bitcoin, with Solana potentially being the next asset Thank you to our sponsors!  Polkadot  |  iTrustCapital Guest Guy Young, founder of Ethena Labs.  Previous appearance on Unchained: How Ethena's USDe Challenges Traditional Stablecoin Models Links Ethena:  Unchained: What Is Ethena’s USDe Synethic Dollar? A Beginner’s Guide Decrypt: Ethena Just Launched to a $1.2 Billion Market Cap: Here’s What You Need to Know  Dust on Crust by Arthur Hayes Airdrop: Unchained: Airdrops From Wormhole and Ethena Labs Set to Inject $2.4 Billion Into Crypto Market This Week  CoinTelegraph: Ethena will become highest revenue-generating crypto project — Delphi Labs CEO ENA Airdrop and Season 2: Sats Campaign  Learn more: What Is a Crypto Airdrop? A Beginner’s Guide MakerDAO/Aave controversy:  The Block: MakerDAO proposes allocating $600 million worth of DAI into USDe and sUSDe The Defiant: DeFi Projects Clash After MakerDAO Adds Ethena’s USDe As Collateral,  Comparisons to Terra’s UST:  Unchained: As Ethena’s USDe Quickly Reaches $2 Billion in Market Cap, Some Wonder If It’s as Risky as Terra’s UST The Defiant: Ethena Stablecoin’s 27% Yield is Triggering Terra-Induced PTSD Andre Cronje’s thoughts on USDe Cointelegraph: Ethena Labs founder clarifies USDe stability amid high yield worries - Unchained Podcast is Produced by Laura Shin Media, LLC.  Distributed by CoinDesk. Senior Producer is Michele Musso and Executive Producer is Jared Schwartz.  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

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Thanks for listening to Unchained, your no-hype resource for all things crypto, on the Coin Desk podcast network. You can also listen to the episodes on to Unchained, your no hype resource for all things Crypto, on the Coin Desk

0:54.9

Podcast Network. You can also listen to the episodes on the Unchained feed earlier if you subscribe

1:00.6

there. Plus, check out all our content on our website, Unchained Crypto.com.

1:06.1

It really is like a very weak surface level argument to like compare what Athena is doing to

1:11.9

Luna. Like really the core difference here, you've just got to think about what is actually

1:15.5

backing the stable assets. Really what I point to here as the core difference between

1:21.1

a lunar and an Athena is that the backing is like real collateral that's sitting behind

1:25.7

the stable rather than like our own

1:27.6

government's token.

1:28.7

Heads up everyone.

1:29.9

In the next few weeks, we're launching a new show on the Unchained channel called Bits and Bips,

1:35.1

exploring how crypto and macro collide, one basis point at a time.

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