CryptoQuant CEO Ki Younger Ju expressed concern over Athena’s latest determination to include Bitcoin as a backing asset for its artificial greenback USDe.
On April 4, Athena Labs revealed false incorporate BTC as a backing asset for USDe to create a safer product for its customers. The corporate stated:
“Following unprecedented progress or USDe since launch, Ethena collateral represents ~20% of ETH open curiosity to this point. With $25 billion of BTC open curiosity that Ethena has to delta hedge, USDe scaling capability has elevated >2.5x.
USDe is a fast-growing “stablecoin” that has attracted appreciable consideration from the neighborhood as a consequence of its excessive annual return of 37%. Notably, its market cap has crossed the $2 billion mark and has seen adoption from main DeFi tasks corresponding to MakerDAO.
neighborhood pursuits
However he was involved that Athena’s BTC determination poses “potential contagion dangers” for bitcoin holders, drawing parallels with the inclusion of flagship digital asset Terra Luna as collateral for its failed algorithmic UST stablecoin.
He requested:
“How do they preserve a delta-neutral technique for $BTC in bear markets? In bull markets, they maintain spot BTC and quick BTC. If there’s a technique to quick BTC by holding some BTC wrapped in DeFi, the market dimension can be lower than its TVL.
Because of this, Ju concluded that USDe was “a CeFi steady coin operated by a hedge fund that’s solely efficient in bull markets. Appropriate me if I am mistaken.”
Moreover, Phantom creator Andre Cronje shared related considerations about Athena. He interviewed The security of the USDe, highlighting the lingering uncertainties regardless of its intensive evaluate and evaluation of the asset.
Cronje additional expressed concern about Athena’s resilience in hostile market situations, evaluating it to how UST works, stating, “It really works till it does not work.”
Athena’s reflection
Nonetheless, defenders of Athena have appeared within the crypto neighborhood, offering an evidence for its distinction from Terra Luna.
Wintermute CEO Evgeny Gaevoy defined that there was no technique to be eradicated, and the one vital dangers concerned arrest and execution. He stated:
“You might be lengthy stETH, quick ETH offender (and use stETH as collateral for the offender place). You can’t be eradicated. The important thing dangers listed here are associated to custody/execution.”
Wintermute is an investor within the protocol.
Seraphim Czecker, Head of Development of Athena, additional he defined platform technique as a easy cash-and-carry enterprise.
In response to him, the platform makes use of minted belongings to acquire BTC, which then serves as collateral to shorten its authentic worth when buying and selling perpetual futures. This strategy goals to compensate BTC declines by growing perp positions accordingly.
Moreover, Ryan Watkins, co-founder of crypto hedge fund Syncracy Capital, rang the bell in that these spreading FUD about Athena in all probability simply have extreme PTSD from UST. Added by:
“After all there are dangers, as with all new protocol, however should you’re on the lookout for a bug, you will in all probability have higher luck wanting elsewhere.”
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