Share this article
Ethena's ENA Soars 43%. What's Fueling the Explosive Rally?
Ethena's governance token ENA has surged 43% this week, becoming the second-best-performing top 100 token by market value.
Jul 21, 2025, 7:00 a.m.
What to know:
- Ethena's governance token ENA has surged 43% this week, becoming the second-best-performing top 100 token by market value.
- The rally is driven by speculation about the activation of a fee switch mechanism for staked ENA (sENA) holders.
- Ethena's USDe has surpassed key thresholds required for the fee switch, with the last parameter expected to be met soon, boosting ENA's momentum.
DeFi protocol Ethena's governance token ENA has surged 43% this week, climbing above 50 cents. It's now the second-best-performing top 100 token by market value, narrowly trailing Curve's CRV, per Coingecko.
The catalyst for the rally is speculation about the activation of the fee switch mechanism for Ethena staked ENA (sENA) token holders, according to Kairos Research.
STORY CONTINUES BELOW
Don't miss another story.Subscribe to the Crypto Daybook Americas Newsletter today. See all newsletters
The fee switch, initially proposed by market maker Wintermute and later approved by the Ethena Foundation in November 2024, enables the sharing of protocol revenue with sENA holders. The revenue primarily comes from mint fees on USDe, Ethena's synthetic dollar, which has an over $6 billion market cap, as well as other protocol revenue streams, and is shared once specific parameters are met.
These parameters include a USDe circulating supply exceeding $6 billion, cumulative protocol revenue surpassing $250 million lifetime, USDe integration on four of the top five centralized exchanges by derivative volumes, and the reserve fund growing to 1% or more of the USDe supply. Additionally, it calls for widening the spread between the annualized percentage yield on staked USDe (sUSDe) and other benchmarks, such as Aave's USDC.
As of Sunday, the USDe's circulating supply, cumulative protocol revenue, and reserve fund exceeded the thresholds mentioned above, according to data tracked by Kairos Research.
"ENA is unique, where the fee switch parameters have already been established, but require certain thresholds to be met or exceeded for it to be formally activated, in which case sENA holders would be the fee recipients," Kairos Research said on X.
It added that the last parameter, tracking the APY spread, was yet to be met, with market flows suggesting it could happen soon.
"The influx of staked sUSDe vs other key benchmarks like Maker/Sky's sUSDS signal that capital allocators expect the spread to widen in Ethena's favor," it noted.
Aside from the potential fee switch activation, the overall bullish trend in the crypto market is adding to the ENA token's upward momentum. The protocol's USDe has attracted over $750 million in fresh inflows recently, as noted by CoinDesk early today.
Read more: Ethena's ENA Soars 20% as Protocol Sees $750M Inflow Amid Rising Crypto Funding Rates
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
Crypto Markets Today: Traders Seek Catalysts After Bitcoin’s Post-Fed Pullback
The crypto market slipped to the lower end of its range after the Federal Reserve’s 25bps rate cut failed to spark fresh momentum.
What to know:
- BTC is trading near $90,350 after defending the $88,200 support zone, but momentum remains capped below the key $94,500 resistance level.
- Implied volatility fell to its lowest since November, ETH/BTC IV spreads widened, and risk reversals stayed negative across tenors while open interest declined—most sharply in ADA.
- Low-liquidity conditions dragged tokens like ETHFI, FET, ADA and PUMP down more than 8%, while privacy-focused XMR stood out with gains as the broader altcoin season index slumped to 19/100.
Top Stories
