DeFi & Tokenization

What you'll learn

• ✓Describe AMMs
• ✓Explain staking

Lessons

1. 🦄
   A Bank With No Employees

   How Uniswap quietly moved trillions
   Start →
2. The Pool That Trades Itself

   Finish the previous lesson to unlock
3. Borrowing Without a Banker

   Finish the previous lesson to unlock
4. Earning by Holding

   Finish the previous lesson to unlock
5. When DeFi Eats Itself

   Finish the previous lesson to unlock
6. Final Boss: Wall Street Shows Up

   Finish the previous lesson to unlock

Sources

All content is drawn from the sources below. We deliberately avoid unverified material.

• Uniswap v2 Core (whitepaper)
  Hayden Adams, Noah Zinsmeister, Dan Robinson (Uniswap, March 2020) · academic
  Primary source for lesson 2's constant-product AMM mechanics (x*y=k), liquidity provision, fee structure, and the impermanent-loss trade-off.
  https://uniswap.org/whitepaper.pdf
• DeFi lessons for traditional finance (BIS Working Paper No. 1066)
  Bank for International Settlements (Aramonte, Doerr, Huang, Schrimpf, January 2023) · institutional
  Used in lessons 1, 3 and 5 for the macro view of DeFi: TVL trajectory (peak ~$180B Nov 2021, ~$50-100B in 2024), lending protocol design, and the 2021-2022 failure cluster.
  https://www.bis.org/publ/work1066.htm
• Aave V3 Technical Paper and Documentation
  Aave Companies · reference
  Reference for lesson 3's mechanics of over-collateralized lending, liquidation thresholds (~80% loan-to-value typical), and liquidator incentives.
  https://docs.aave.com/
• Compound III (Comet) documentation
  Compound Labs · reference
  Reference for lesson 3 on collateralized lending and liquidation flow on the other major DeFi lending protocol.
  https://docs.compound.finance/
• The Merge (Ethereum Foundation post and consensus specs)
  Ethereum Foundation · institutional
  Source for lesson 4's claims about the proof-of-stake transition on September 15, 2022 (block 15537393), validator economics, and the ~99.95% drop in network energy use.
  https://ethereum.org/en/roadmap/merge/
• Ethereum and the Merge (Federal Reserve History / FEDS Notes coverage)
  Federal Reserve · institutional
  Backs the institutional framing of the Merge in lesson 4 and the macro-economic context of DeFi referenced in lessons 1 and 3.
  https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/index.htm
• Lido protocol documentation and stETH design
  Lido DAO · reference
  Reference for lesson 4's description of liquid staking, stETH as a tokenized claim, and Lido's ~28-30% share of all staked ETH.
  https://docs.lido.fi/
• BIS Quarterly Review (September 2022): The crypto ecosystem and the May 2022 turmoil
  Bank for International Settlements · institutional
  Used in lesson 5 for Terra/Luna's algorithmic-stablecoin death spiral and the ~$40B loss figure.
  https://www.bis.org/publ/qtrpdf/r_qt2209.htm
• FBI Public Service Announcement: North Korean State-Sponsored Cyber Actors and the Ronin Bridge
  U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (April 14, 2022) · institutional
  Primary source for lesson 5's attribution of the March 2022 Ronin Bridge hack (~$625M) to North Korea's Lazarus Group.
  https://www.fbi.gov/news/press-releases/fbi-statement-on-attribution-of-malicious-cyber-activity-posed-by-the-democratic-peoples-republic-of-korea
• CFTC v. Eisenberg (Mango Markets exploit complaint)
  U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (2023) · institutional
  Backs lesson 5's account of the Mango Markets oracle-manipulation incident on October 11, 2022 and the regulatory response.
  https://www.cftc.gov/PressRoom/PressReleases/8647-23
• BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL) prospectus and Securitize disclosures
  BlackRock / Securitize · institutional
  Source for lesson 6's details on the BUIDL fund: March 2024 launch, Ethereum-based tokens, ~$520M AUM by end of 2024.
  https://securitize.io/learn/press/blackrock-launches-first-tokenized-fund-buidl-on-the-ethereum-network
• Relevance of On-Chain Asset Tokenization in 'Crypto Winter' (BCG / ADDX 2022 report)
  Boston Consulting Group and ADDX · article
  Source for lesson 6's projection of ~$16 trillion in tokenized illiquid assets by 2030. Forecast, not fact, and labeled as such in the lesson.
  https://web-assets.bcg.com/1e/a2/5b5f2b7e42dfad2cb3113a291222/on-chain-asset-tokenization.pdf
• FSB Report: The Financial Stability Risks of Crypto-Asset Activities (2023 review)
  Financial Stability Board · institutional
  Cross-references the regulatory perspective on the 2022 failures (Terra, FTX, bridges), used in lessons 5 and 6.
  https://www.fsb.org/2023/02/the-financial-stability-risks-of-crypto-asset-activities/