It with great care happens that Polkadot, Chainlink and NearProtocol have all created nice progress

As the field of decentralized finance (DeFi) continues to develop simultaneously with the booming cryptocurrency ecosystem, Ethereum is not the only blockchain platform with significant growth in value. In the new year, the DeFi field continues to perform well, as can be clearly seen from the huge value flowing into various platforms.

Data analysis platform DappRadar stated that on January 20, the value of the DeFi protocol briefly exceeded $27 billion, partly due to the increase in the value of most cryptocurrencies. However, in recent months, the adoption and development of this field has been increasing.

Ethereum is currently the most popular smart contract blockchain application for developers and projects for building and publishing applications and platforms. The DeFi field is closely connected with the current state of Ethereum, and most of the largest DeFi projects and protocols are running on the Ethereum blockchain. According to data from DeFi Pulse, Uniswap is the largest automated market maker, which runs on Ethereum, while the remaining top 10 DeFi projects also run on this blockchain network.

Although the growth and success of DeFi platforms have put pressure on the Ethereum network's ability to process transactions and increased transaction fees, these platforms have brought huge lock-in value to the Ethereum ecosystem. Having said that, some of Ethereum's market competitors achieved great success in early 2021, which shows that more participants are promoting the development of the DeFi field.

Polkadot, Chainlink and Near Protocol have all made great progress

Polkadot is regarded as one of Ethereum's most prominent competitors. It is a new generation of blockchain connecting private and public blockchains and networks. The project was initiated by the Web3 Foundation, hoping to drive interoperability between blockchains and provide impetus for future decentralized networks.

Polkadot essentially uses what it calls a "parachain" to run a multi-chain protocol, which allows other blockchains to connect to its network in the form of side chains. The protocol also has the ability to process thousands of transactions per second, which in the opinion of some commentators makes it a competitor to Ethereum. Polkadot achieved tremendous growth in 2021, and the price of its DOT tokens has almost doubled since entering the new year.

Near Protocol is another smart contract blockchain platform that has been popular since its launch in April 2020. Its native token NEAR has recently increased in value by more than 100%. The project is based on its proof-of-stake protocol using sharding, and Ethereum is still working hard to implement the Near Protocol this year.

Cardano, which runs on its own proof-of-stake blockchain, has also achieved some growth. Its native token Ada has surpassed Bitcoin Cash (BCH) to become the sixth largest cryptocurrency by market value. The platform has not yet launched a powerful smart contract, but it is expected to be launched this year, which will allow the DeFi platform to be built on the agreement.

Chainlink is also on the list for its role in the field of smart contract blockchain and DeFi. Chainlink is a decentralized oracle network. As an intermediary network, it provides data for smart contracts on different blockchains. According to the project, Chainlink has become the main tool in the DeFi field because it provides tamper-proof, high-quality price data for various DeFi protocols.

As Chainlink continues to enjoy the indirect impact of DeFi's success, the network's native token LINK entered the top 10 cryptocurrency list in January.

The term "great repricing" is widely used in the DeFi space, as the native tokens of popular platforms Synthetix and Aave also ranked among the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization in early 2021. The value growth of Synthetix Network Token (SNX) and AAVE is considerable, with their combined market value exceeding US$3.5 billion. SNX is the native token of the derivatives liquidity protocol Synthetix, and Aave is a liquidity protocol that allows users to deposit and borrow various cryptocurrency assets. Both Synthetix and Aave run on the Ethereum blockchain.