1. BNB
The designed maximum supply of BNB is 200 million coins, and it aims to achieve a deflationary model through a continuous destruction mechanism, with the goal of eventually reducing the total supply to 100 million coins. Currently, there are still 140 million coins in circulation. The average annual destruction is 6.5 million coins, and it will take about 6.25 years to destroy another 40 million coins, roughly matching one bullish-bearish cycle. Among these, the 80 million BNB abandoned by the team is an important part of the destruction, and a large proportion of the destruction does not come from secondary market repurchase.
The destruction of BNB is partly achieved through quarterly automatic destruction, which calculates the amount to be destroyed based on the BNB price and the number of blocks generated on the BNB Chain. This process is independent of the Binance exchange and aims to eliminate the possibility of human manipulation; on the other hand, a portion of the transaction fees is destroyed in each block to achieve a continuous reduction in supply, similar to Ethereum.
The main value support of BNB: the main currency application of BSC gas fees, Binance trading fee discounts (equating to actual buybacks), Binance Launchpad (users need to hold BNB to participate in new project token sales).
A must-have cyclical token.
2. SOL
The economic model of SOL is similar to that of Ethereum, rewarding stakers and validators by issuing new SOL tokens to maintain network security. The initial inflation rate is 8%, but this rate will decrease annually, with a long-term goal of stabilizing the annual inflation rate at 1.5%. The deflationary part uses a transaction fee burn mechanism, where a portion of each transaction fee is permanently removed from circulation. The current inflation rate is approximately 4.7%.
SOL's mainnet launch has been pending for several years, but some tokens have not yet been unlocked, mainly due to the bankruptcy liquidation of FTX. FTX had heavily invested in SOL, and these assets were required by the court to be sold during bankruptcy proceedings to repay creditors, with these SOL being auctioned to institutions in batches and setting future unlocking times.
In September 2025, 7.98 million SOL will be unlocked, and in November, 26.67 million will be unlocked.
3. BUIDL
In the process of understanding various RWA products, it was found that BUIDL has become their underlying asset. For example, Ondo Finance transferred $95 million of assets from its tokenized short-term bond fund (OUSG) to BUIDL; Ethena Labs allocated most of the reserves of its synthetic dollar stablecoin (USDtb) to BUIDL.
So, what is BUIDL? BUIDL is a tokenized money market fund, launched by BlackRock on Ethereum in March 2024 (now expanded to multiple mainnets through cross-chain protocols), with the core goal of seeking current yield while maintaining liquidity and principal stability. It is a private placement product strictly targeted at qualified investors (individuals with $5 million and institutions with $25 million). 1 BUIDL ≈ 1 USD. Due to its private placement nature, real-time inquiries on public exchanges are not possible. Ordinary investors cannot purchase it directly.
It can be simply understood as compliant, stable, interest-bearing on-chain US Treasury bonds. The BUIDL fund invests 100% of its total assets into a portfolio consisting of cash, US Treasury bonds, and repurchase agreements. The income of BUIDL comes from the interest generated daily by its underlying assets. These accumulated dividends will be 'airdropped' to investors' wallets in the form of new BUIDL tokens monthly.
As of mid-2025, its scale has approached $2.9 billion, becoming the world's largest tokenized treasury bond fund, accounting for about 40% of the market for tokenized US Treasury bonds at that time.
4. ENA
Ethena Labs is a decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol built on the Ethereum blockchain, and the team is the project party of the synthetic dollar stablecoin USDe. Ethena has completed three rounds of financing, with a total financing amount reaching $119.5 million.
USDe is a synthetic dollar stablecoin that maintains a 1:1 peg to the US dollar through algorithms. After users deposit ETH, BTC, and other crypto assets into the ENA protocol to obtain USDe, the protocol not only holds these spot assets but also opens equivalent short positions in the perpetual contract market. Thus, regardless of whether the collateral asset price rises or falls, the profit and loss of the spot and derivative positions will offset each other, striving to maintain the 1:1 peg of USDe to the US dollar.
The income from USDe mainly comes from two parts: the yield generated from staking deposited ETH and other assets (annualized about 3-4%). Additionally, in the perpetual contract market, when market bullish sentiment is strong (about 85% of the time), the bullish side needs to pay the funding rate to the bearish side. Ethena, as the short side, can collect this fee (the average funding rates for Bitcoin and Ethereum in 2024 are approximately 11% and 12.6%, respectively). These earnings are distributed to users staking USDe (holding sUSDe), providing an average annualized yield of about 19% in 2024.
USDe was launched in January 2024, and by September 15, its circulating market value had reached 13.6 billion, more than doubling in the past two months. The growth mainly comes from the expansion of the perpetual futures market, providing Ethena with more funding rate income opportunities; Binance also recently listed USDe; and the ecosystem, specifically designed for USDe, has launched the Ethereal perpetual DEX (which attracted $1 billion in locked value before the mainnet launch) and introduced the Convergence Chain (an L2 chain) that uses USDe as its native gas token.
Of course, most importantly, the Russian nesting doll amplifies returns. Users conduct complex recursive operations through Pendle (a yield derivative platform) and Aave (a lending protocol) (for example: staking USDe → obtaining sUSDe → splitting in Pendle → collateralizing to borrow more USDe → cycling), greatly amplifying the demand and exposure to USDe. When the funding rate is positive (the more bullish the market sentiment, the better), the annualized yield from staking USDe through extreme nesting can even reach 100%.
The main risks lie in two points: if market sentiment turns to a sustained bearish outlook and the funding rate turns negative, Ethena will need to pay fees, which could erode profits and even reserves. Currently, it has about $60 million in reserve funds to provide a buffer, but it's not unlimited.
Secondly, there's the chain reaction of DeFi leverage cycles: USDe is highly concentrated in protocols like Aave and Pendle (for example, 70% of deposits on Pendle are related to Ethena). If its model encounters issues, it may trigger a broader liquidity crisis in DeFi. Users pursuing yield through recursive borrowing and leverage may trigger chain liquidations under extreme market conditions. Those interested can delve deeper into this.
Additionally, it's essential to understand that merely holding USDe typically does not generate yield; to pursue yield, one needs to stake it as sUSDe (which can be understood as a yield token or yield certificate).
ENA is the governance token of the Ethena protocol; it does not directly stabilize the US dollar peg but represents the voice in the future development of the protocol. Staking ENA can earn sENA, which currently primarily allows holders to receive token distributions from ecosystem partners, and in the future, when the 'Fee Switch' mechanism is enabled, there is hope to share part of the protocol's revenue (the conditions for Fee Switch have been met and await community voting).
In other words, the revenue from issuing USDe is currently unrelated to ENA holders (it should be related in the future); ENA holders' earnings currently only come from airdrops within its ecosystem. The future prospects are promising, as Ethena is not only expanding its product line (developing the spot trading platform Ethereal and the on-chain options protocol Derive) but also building its own blockchain (Ethena Chain). The prosperity of these ecosystems will bring more application scenarios and demand for ENA. For example, ENA may be used as gas fees within these ecosystems, thereby enhancing its intrinsic value.
In terms of chips, the top 5 addresses of ENA control about 60%+ of the circulating chips, and the cost is clear, with stable holdings. Project tokens are all like this, similar to BNB.
Additionally, StablecoinX raised $890 million to purchase and lock ENA long-term. StablecoinX is essentially a micro-strategy for ENA but has not yet been listed.
In addition to sUEDe, there are also interest-bearing stablecoins (various supported by US Treasury bonds and other real-world assets):
sDAI: provided by MakerDAO through the Spark Protocol. When you deposit DAI into Spark, you will receive sDAI, which will automatically increase in value, with an annualized yield of approximately 5-8%. The income comes from various sources, including stable fees from loans, liquidation profits, DeFi lending, and tokenized assets of US Treasury bonds.
USDY (Ondo Finance): annualized yield of about 4-5%.
USDM (Mountain Protocol): annualized yield of about 4-5%.
USDtb (Ethena Labs and BlackRock): annualized yield of approximately 3-5%.
5. Some stablecoin chains have yet to emerge.
Arc (launched by Circle): it uses USDC as the native gas fee token.
Plasma (launched by Tether): It allows users to directly pay fees using USDT or Bitcoin without having to hold the native token XPL separately (but XPL is the ultimate settlement medium for network security). The XPL token is the core of the Plasma ecosystem, and node staking incentivizes validators to participate in ecological governance.
Of course, most importantly, XPL is the final settlement currency: although Plasma allows users to pay transaction fees (Gas Fee) using assets such as USDT or Bitcoin to enhance user experience, these fees will be converted into XPL for final settlement within the protocol. Therefore, XPL is the actual settlement unit of network resources. The oracle within the system will automatically convert non-XPL assets into XPL at market price for deductions. So, those optimistic about Plasma can buy XPL.
Stable (launched by Tether): its main feature is providing users with a zero-fee USDT transfer experience and launching various USDT variants (standard USDT, USDT0 for bridging, gasUSDT for fees) to adapt to different scenarios.
Converge (supported by Ethena): It supports using Ethena's synthetic dollar stablecoin USDe and others to pay fees. The biggest innovation of Converge is its 'optional permission' model. This means that on the same chain, there can be fully open DeFi activities as well as compliant financial services that meet KYC/KYB requirements, attempting to break the barriers between traditional finance and DeFi.
6. ONDO
ONDO Finance is an American company focused on RWA tokenization. It has three products.
One is USDY (United States Dollar Yield): a yield-bearing stablecoin backed by US Treasury bonds. It charges a 0.17% fee. Currently, $700 million is locked.
There is also OUSG (Short-Term US Government Treasuries): a tokenized short-term US government bond fund. It charges a 0.15% management fee annually.
And Ondo Global Markets: a platform for RWA trading, has been launched and has deployed hundreds of tokenized stocks.
Regarding the Ondo Global Markets, it claims to integrate the vast liquidity of traditional exchanges (like Nasdaq) to avoid on-chain liquidity fragmentation (which is a bit complex to explain), supporting '24/5' trading. This means that during the main trading hours of the US stock market, the liquidity of this exchange is sufficient; during the pre-market and after-hours trading phases, it connects to alternative trading systems (ATS), like Blue Ocean, to provide basic liquidity; on weekends, holidays, and overnight periods, liquidity completely relies on P2P trading among on-chain users (which is unfortunately as scarce as most RWA exchanges). Currently, this platform adopts a 'compliance-first' strategy, with strict KYC and qualified investor reviews, primarily targeting non-US users.
In terms of user experience on RWA trading platforms, Ondo currently has the best performance.
ONDO Finance has issued its native platform token ONDO, allowing holders to participate in voting on key decisions such as protocol upgrades and product parameter adjustments through the Ondo DAO. Then, that's it. In the future, it may tie ONDO holdings to fee discounts or other privileges, but not currently.
That is: the income of ONDO Finance is currently unrelated to ONDO holders; ONDO holders currently have some governance rights but receive no income (it is said that there will be buybacks from the fee income). The direct value support of ONDO tokens is relatively weak, and their price reflects market expectations of Ondo's future potential in the RWA sector.
7. HYPE
Hyperliquid is a decentralized exchange focused on perpetual contract trading, occupying 70-80% of the market share in the decentralized perpetual contract market, far surpassing DYDX. Its current circulating market value is 17.7 billion.
Firstly: HLP Treasury (the protocol treasury of the Hyperliquid platform). It is the liquidity provision mechanism of Hyperliquid, responsible for the main source of liquidity on the platform and settlement duties. Users deposit money into the HLP Treasury (USDC can be deposited), earn returns through the internal operations of the HLP Treasury (market making and clearing), and then distribute 46% of the earnings to depositors, with 54% used to buy back and burn HYPE tokens. The platform has shared and spent its most important income, which is impressive. Currently, its protocol treasury offers an annualized interest rate of 8%, with a maximum drawdown of 0.02%, allowing some USDC to be deposited as a form of wealth management.
There is also a type of treasury called a user treasury, which operates on a completely different logic. Basically, it is a copy trading model. If the treasury strategy is profitable, the treasury owner takes a 10-20% profit share (the platform calls it a performance fee), and you as the follower receive most of the profit after deducting the performance fee. If the treasury incurs losses, followers will also bear the losses proportionately. The platform itself does not directly take a cut; its profit model is to increase the overall trading volume generated by the treasury's trading activities, thereby enhancing the protocol's fee income.
Secondly, of course, Hyperliquid L1 is a proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain. Like Ethereum, HYPE holders can delegate to validators to earn staking rewards, currently with an annualized rate of about 2.2%, needing to give validators a few points of commission.
Thirdly, some B2B businesses. For example, Builder Codes business allows developers to build trading applications using Hyperliquid infrastructure and earn fee sharing from the trades they guide. Phantom has launched perpetual contract trading through Hyperliquid. Another example is the HIP-3 proposal, which allows anyone to create a perpetual contract market by staking 1 million HYPE.
The total supply of the HYPE token is 1 billion, with 333 million in circulation. This circulation is mainly from the genesis airdrop, and the unlocked purposes mainly lie in community, team, liquidity, and ecosystem development. There are no VC investments.
Additionally, HYPE is currently preparing to issue the stablecoin USDH. Regardless of the final plan, the interest income generated from the reserves of USDH will be used to buy back HYPE, which is again a support point for the token price. The Hyperliquid ecosystem currently holds about $6 billion of USDC, which is all set to be replaced.
Apart from team changes, HYPE's price comes from the platform's income buybacks (related to data) and investor expectations (related to bull and bear markets). Focus mainly on these two aspects. Small indicators can pay attention to the scale of USDH and the growth rate of protocol treasury income.
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