Share this article
Yearn.finance's YFI Token Surges 22% to New Record as DeFi Platform Adds Collateral
Since April, collateral locked in the digital-asset investing platform has more than doubled, outpacing industry growth.
Updated Sep 14, 2021, 12:53 p.m. Published May 11, 2021, 6:29 p.m.
The digital-asset management platform Yearn.finance's governance token, YFI, jumped 22% Tuesday to an all-time high in price, joining the rally in recent months of cryptocurrencies linked to the fast-growing decentralized finance sector known as DeFi.
STORY CONTINUES BELOW
Don't miss another story.Subscribe to the Crypto Daybook Americas Newsletter today. See all newsletters
YFI clocked a new high of $78,019 around 14:30 coordinated universal time (10:30 a.m. ET) and was changing hands near $74,500 at press time.
The token's price has tripled this year. That includes a 40% rise so far in May, with most of that gain coming in the past 24 hours. But YFI has lagged behind other DeFi standouts. So far this year, the native token of decentalized protocol Aave, AAVE, has shot up 700% and MakerDAO's MKR. has risen 400%.
"The rally was overdue, given the token's relative underperformance compared to other DeFi blue chips," Denis Vinokourov, head of research at Synergia Capital, told CoinDesk in a Telegram chat.
Although the token is still trailing its DeFi peers in price this year, the protocol has seen stronger growth in recent weeks.
Just since the start of April, Yearn.finance has more than doubled the collateral locked into its protocol, to about $4.1 billion, according to the website DeFi Pulse. During the same time frame, the total value locked in the DeFi market has increased by 70% to $80 billion.
"Yearn's growth trajectory has been very strong," Vinokourov said.
I am very bullish about YFI, here’s why The TVL growing speed of @iearnfinance is very scary, specially if you compare it to other protocols such as Maker, sushi, uni and Aave. Yes Their TVLs gone up a lot as well, but its mainly from eth price raises pic.twitter.com/7jIo3z4stC
— Molly (@bigmagicdao) May 11, 2021
YFI has a very small circulating supply, at around 36,000 coins, according to data aggregator CoinGecko. That helps explain why the token, which has a market capitalization of about $2.6 billion, has a higher price than the $56,558 bitcoin (BTC), which has a market value of $1.06 trillion.
Ease of use of YFI in a hot DeFi market, in addition to low supply, may be contributing to the high price.
"It’s been the Tesla of self-driving investment management," said Rich Rosenblum, co-founder of crypto market maker GSR.
Rosenblum said he's concerned about YFI's competition heating up, however.
"Crypto moves a lot faster than autos, and others are hot on the trail," Rosenblum said.
More For You
What to know:
- As of October 2025, GoPlus has generated $4.7M in total revenue across its product lines. The GoPlus App is the primary revenue driver, contributing $2.5M (approx. 53%), followed by the SafeToken Protocol at $1.7M.
- GoPlus Intelligence's Token Security API averaged 717 million monthly calls year-to-date in 2025 , with a peak of nearly 1 billion calls in February 2025. Total blockchain-level requests, including transaction simulations, averaged an additional 350 million per month.
- Since its January 2025 launch , the $GPS token has registered over $5B in total spot volume and $10B in derivatives volume in 2025. Monthly spot volume peaked in March 2025 at over $1.1B , while derivatives volume peaked the same month at over $4B.
More For You
Coinbase Sees Crypto Recovery Ahead as Liquidity Improves and Fed Rate Cut Odds Climb
The crypto exchange also took note of a so-called AI bubble that continues to go strong and a weaker U.S. dollar.
What to know:
- Coinbase Institutional is seeing a potential December recovery in crypto, citing improving liquidity and a shift in macroeconomic conditions that could favor risk assets like bitcoin.
- The firm's optimism is driven by rising odds of Federal Reserve rate cuts, with markets pricing in a 93% chance easing next week, and improving liquidity conditions.
- Several recent institutional developments, including Vanguard's crypto ETF policy reversal and Bank of America's greenlighting of crypto allocations, have contributed to bitcoin's rebound from recent lows.
Top Stories
