To be honest, there aren’t many #DeFi projects in this bull market that have truly caught my eye. Most DEXs are still the same old story: competing on fees, breadth, and incentives, which ultimately leads to either a scenario where there’s nothing left to gain or creating a "pseudo-decentralized" liquidity pool.
As an old hand who has been in the crypto space for many years, I was recently amazed by the @Terminal_fi project. This is not an ordinary DEX; it is backed by Ethena Labs, which has created USDe synthetic dollars, essentially holding the key to "crypto-native dollars" to reconstruct the trading market. Moreover, #Terminal's positioning is not in competition with Uniswap or HyperLiquid; rather, it aims to unify the capital and yield flows of the entire #Ethena ecosystem, making USDe / sUSDe the "new capital base" of DeFi, with supported assets including USDe, sUSDe, USDtb (dollar income assets supported by BlackRock BUIDL), ETH, BTC.
When I first saw the data, I really couldn't sit still. First of all, this guy has locked in over 300 million USD before officially launching, directly breaking the DEX pre-heating record. How did he do it? He created three 'VIP investment pools' to allow everyone to deposit money and reserve their spot: 225 million USDe (Ethena's synthetic USD), 10,000 ETH, and 100 BTC. Now all three pools have been snapped up, resembling a 'celebrity store opening queue' in the crypto world. What's even crazier is that the more than 10,000 wallet addresses that participated in the pre-deposit can later claim airdrop candies, making user binding extremely smooth. Moreover, #Terminal DEX is expected to launch this December, and this round of airdrops is bound to be a big deal!
#Terminal's core weapon is that it combines 'making money' with 'trading'. In traditional DEX, the transaction fee is gone after you trade, but here there's a slick operation called [Yield Skimming]—the stablecoins you deposit (like sUSDe) are already earning staking rewards, and now these rewards will automatically roll back into the trading pool. Terminal will skim these rewards out and distribute them to LPs, turning them into thicker liquidity to lower slippage. It's like your deposited money earns interest while helping you save on transaction fees, a double buff effect. Their CEO stated: 'We are playing with interest-bearing USD, and liquidity efficiency crushes traditional stablecoins.'
Looking at the assets it connects to, they're all top-tier in the crypto world: not only can you use USDe/sUSDe, which are 'investment-type USD' with built-in earnings, but you can also directly trade BlackRock's BUIDL fund token USDtb. In simple terms, it connects high-quality assets from traditional finance with cryptocurrencies like ETH/BTC in the shortest path possible, which is a level above just creating a meme coin exchange. The strategic head of #Ethena put it more straightforwardly: 'Our assets are already the blood of #DeFi, and Terminal is like creating a heart for this blood.'
Lastly, let's talk about how to reap the rewards: the pre-deposit phase has now ended, but don't panic! Their token airdrop hasn't been distributed yet. According to the rules announced by #Ethena, those who have held sENA (Ethena ecosystem token) since the end of June will be able to receive Terminal tokens based on their points ratio, potentially getting up to 10% of the total supply. This is equivalent to giving early ecosystem users a 'pre-IPO subscription certificate'.
Overall, #Terminal's operation essentially expands #Ethena's 'synthetic USD empire' from the payment layer to the trading layer. It also adds #Ethena's $10 billion network expansion and deep ties with Binance, which shows immense potential. While others are still caught up in zero Gas fees, it directly restructures the liquidity production relationship, turning every locked-in fund into a 'goose that lays golden eggs'. At this point when institutional funds are accelerating their entry, an exchange that bridges TradFi and DeFi is likely to become the next cycle's traffic entry point, worthy of close attention and focus 🧐
