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A lot has happened in the DeFi world since we last spoke.

We have seen the ludicrous craze surrounding a new yield farming protocol called Yam, with investors throwing more than $600 million dollars into the unaudited project in less than 7 days. Chainlink and their token $link continue to find huge support, buyers stepping in at every pullback and price up almost 80% over the past week. But most importantly, as of a couple hours ago, TVL or “Total Value Locked” in the DeFi ecosystem has surpassed the $5 billion-dollar mark with daily trading volume eclipsing that of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange more than 5-fold.

Source: Defi Pulse

Why So Self-Sovereign?

We wouldn’t be doing this all for fun, well we could, but that’s not the point. The reason we have undertaken this journey is simple, banks suck and they control a large, tender part of our lives.

Going bankless gives you two creature comforts 99% of the world’s population will sadly never have:

  1. Less dependence on central banks and their archaic monetary policy.
  2. Less dependence on commercial banks and their lack of real yield.

Not only will we achieve two monumental financial goals, but we will also notice two very paradoxical plot twists:

  1. The majority of our net worth will lie in this new financial system.
  2. The majority of modern-day financial transactions will take place within this new financial system.

Now don’t be afraid, we’re here to take baby steps.

Where do I get my hands on some of this digital money?

Much like the traditional financial system we have choices in terms of who we interact and transact with in the Cryptoverse.

We have centralized exchanges such as Binance and Coinbase and we have decentralized exchanges (or DEXs) such as Uniswap and Bancor. The difference between the two types of exchanges is simple, we’re either transacting through a middleman, paying and trusting people with our money or, we’re transacting peer-peer, paying and trusting a digital protocol. There are other differences, pros and cons which I will discuss in more detail throughout my upcoming webinar series but that’s the big one.

Where do I keep my digital money?

Once we’ve decided which route of exchange we want to take and we’ve stacked up some of our favorite coins, deciding where to keep them is the next question.

Again, just like the traditional financial system, we have choices. Thanks to the months of research done before me and to keep things short and sweet my go to DeFi wallets are Metamask for desktop and Argent for mobile, I’ll let you know if that ever changes. A cold wallet is something also worth considering for those of us who want to put our coins in the safe and forget about them, Ledger is my favourite.

So now what?

Now that we are proud cryptocurrency owners, we can consider ourselves “shareholders” in whichever projects and therefore, coins, tickled our fancy. The prices of these coins will fluctuate just like traditional stock prices do, hopefully increasing over time more than they decrease but now that we own some the opportunities become plentiful.

I’ll see you on Thursday where we will dive deeper beneath the surface and start exploring the various protocols and what they can offer us in terms of value, capital preservation and capital growth.

 

 

 

 

Young citizen of the world, inspired by and in awe of all things Fourth Industrial Revolution. A bachelor of commerce student with a background in the Financial Services, Commodities, Fintech and Cryptocurrency environments. Jarryd is a seasoned business development and strategic sales consultant, content creator, HODLer by day and Trader by night.