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Web3 DeFi Tools

CFIRE

How to Invest in DeFi

Practical Guide to Investing in DeFi with $10K

Kickstarting Your Investment Journey in DeFi

Picture this: you’ve got $10,000 burning a hole in your pocket, and the world of decentralized finance (DeFi) beckons with promises of high yields and innovative investment strategies. The question is, how do you turn that modest sum into something more substantial without getting lost in the complex landscape of crypto? This lesson will provide you with valuable insights into how you can navigate the DeFi space effectively, tailored specifically for smaller portfolios.

By the end of this lesson, you will learn:

  1. How to strategically allocate a $10,000 investment in DeFi.
  2. The significance of big cap vs. small cap investments.
  3. How to leverage collateral for maximizing your investment potential.
  4. The essentials of managing risks to safeguard your portfolio.

Maximizing Your $10K: Strategic DeFi Investments

In this lesson, we delve into a carefully crafted strategy for investing $10,000 or less in the world of decentralized finance, as articulated in a recent discussion on investment approaches. The main argument is simple yet profound: with a limited capital, the tactics tend to shift significantly compared to those for larger portfolios, emphasizing higher growth while managing risk.

Key points include not merely looking for immediate income but centering investments around growth potential. As stated, “I wouldn’t really be looking to collect an income that depends on your goals, of course, but I wouldn’t be looking to take any out.” This strategic approach encourages the growth of your asset base instead of generating immediate, lower yields.

Another compelling point raised is the importance of selecting blue-chip cryptocurrencies and well-established projects for a reliable foundation in your portfolio. “For a smaller amount, we’ll still do big cap and blue chip stuff typically especially in a bull run.” Here, the connection to reliable assets becomes crucial, as investing in proven projects can reduce volatility and emotional strain.

The conversation also highlights the potential of leveraging your investments, expertly maneuvering between lending and borrowing to expand your portfolio’s capacity. “I could borrow an asset then I could go use it to make yields,” encapsulates how savvy DeFi investors can unlock value trapped in their holdings by generating additional returns without selling assets.


Steps to Follow

  1. Focus on Stable Coins: Begin by stabilizing your portfolio with stable coins to reinvest strategically without immediate withdrawals.
  2. Invest in Big Cap Assets: Allocate approximately 40% of your capital to established cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum to mitigate risks associated with smaller investments.
  3. Mid to Small Cap Exploration: Consider channeling 20-30% into mid to small cap assets, targeting specific high-yield cryptocurrencies with potential for appreciation.
  4. Lending and Borrowing Strategy: Leverage your holdings as collateral to expand your investment power. Engage with platforms such as Aave to lend and borrow effectively within the ecosystem.
  5. Active Portfolio Management: Stay hands-on with your investments initially to ensure that you can react to market changes swiftly. Avoid automation until your portfolio is larger.

Building a Strong Portfolio with Limited Capital

The essentials of investment strategy in smaller DeFi portfolios, including the nuanced approach to allocation and leveraging, form the core of the lesson. Let’s break down some key strengths:

  1. Strategic Focus on Growth Over Income: The instructor’s emphasis on foregoing immediate withdrawals for longer-term growth is compelling. By holding onto stable coins rather than extracting profits, investors can reap higher total returns through compound growth over time. This principle aligns well with the ideas espoused in growth-focused investment philosophies across various asset classes.

  2. Blue-Chip Reliability in Volatile Markets: By investing primarily in larger, more established cryptocurrencies, the risks associated with the notorious volatility of smaller caps are significantly reduced. The notion that “a few percentile swings on a big portfolio can oftentimes emotionally and mentally mess with us” resonates deeply with many investors embarking on their DeFi journey. This focus on ‘blue-chip’ assets provides a psychological buffer while still enabling investors to capture the benefits of emerging bull markets.

  3. Leveraging for Greater Portfolio Reach: The innovative approach of leveraging existing crypto to increase your investment base showcases a deep understanding of the mechanics within DeFi. The statement, “I could borrow something against it and then go use that to make yields,” indicates a sophisticated grasp of how to utilize DeFi platforms to maximize gains without needing external capital infusion. This strategy can lead to considerable returns if executed with a meticulous understanding of risk management.

  4. Active Management vs. Automation: The juxtaposition of the need for hands-on management at the early stages versus potential automation later reflects an adaptive investment strategy. This flexibility caters to the investor’s evolving experience, risk tolerance, and market conditions.

While the articulated strategies are strong, there are potential limitations to consider.

  1. Volatility Risks in Smaller Caps: Investing a portion of the portfolio in smaller caps does present risks, particularly in bearish market conditions. The potential for loss in spite of high yields can be significant.

  2. Market Timing Challenges: Being hands-on can lead to emotional decision-making, particularly in fast-moving markets. Maintaining discipline and avoiding impulsive trades are essential traits often overlooked.

  3. Understanding Liquidity Risks: Engaging in leverage and lending should be approached with caution, particularly concerning loan-to-value ratios. If poorly managed, this can expose investors to liquidation risks.


Maximizing Your $10K: Strategic DeFi Investments

Understanding how these investment strategies apply to the broader context of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology is vital. The principles discussed can be harmonized beautifully with decentralized finance (DeFi), which is built on the notion of direct peer-to-peer transactions without intermediaries.

  • Ecosystem Applications: A perfect example includes DeFi platforms like Aave and Uniswap, which facilitate lending and trading respectively. These platforms embody the principles of leveraging existing capital, allowing users to borrow against their assets to invest in other opportunities, thereby enhancing the growth potential of their portfolios.

  • DeFi Innovations: With DeFi continuing to evolve, new protocols are emerging that offer different risk-reward profiles for small investors. Projects focused on yield farming and liquidity pools exemplify how these strategies can align with growth principles discussed in the lesson.

  • Navigating through Challenges: Investors need to remain capable of adapting their strategies based on market conditions. For instance, in a bear market, providing liquidity on decentralized exchanges can sometimes yield better returns than static holding of assets, allowing investors to earn fees while also potentially benefiting from appreciation.


Wider Outlook and Impact

The insights presented in this lesson hold broader significance for the future of finance as we know it. As decentralized finance gains traction, the implications for traditional banking systems—and their users—are profound. Traditional banks may need to rethink service offerings to remain competitive as more individuals explore DeFi options for yields that were previously unavailable.

  • Societal Impacts: The democratization of finance through blockchain technology empowers individuals, providing them with alternatives to established financial systems. This financial inclusivity fosters an environment where potentially transformative financial innovations can thrive.

  • Future Predictions: As the crypto landscape evolves with rapidly changing technologies, we can expect to see increased institutional involvement, further mature regulatory frameworks, and an expanded range of DeFi products entering the market.

  • Technological Influence: The intersection of traditional finance and blockchain innovation continues to reshape perspectives on investment strategies. With the rise of programmable money and smart contracts, new opportunities for scaling investments efficiently will emerge, with the potential to revolutionize how retail investors operate in the markets.


Personal Commentary and Insights

From my perspective, the discussion about leveraging capital within the DeFi ecosystem offers not just innovative investment strategies but also provides an exciting glimpse into the future of finance. As the landscape continues to shift, what stands out is the necessity for thorough education, community support, and a willingness to adapt strategies based on market conditions.

Investing in DeFi isn’t merely about profit; it requires a mindset shift towards actively managing your financial future. As I reflect on my own experiences in navigating this space, the willingness to learn, engage with like-minded peers, and continually adapt has proven invaluable.


Conclusion

The journey to understanding how to invest $10,000 or less in DeFi reveals not just a pathway to financial growth but also an insight into the future of decentralized finance as a viable alternative to traditional methods.

These strategies aren’t just about potentially multiplying your investment—they encompass a broader movement towards financial autonomy and empowerment that the blockchain technology enables. Embracing these concepts can set investors on the path towards long-term wealth accumulation, while also joining a community striving for progress.


Quotes:

  1. “I wouldn’t really be looking to collect an income that depends on your goals, of course, but I wouldn’t be looking to take any out.”
  2. “For a smaller amount, we’ll still do big cap and blue chip stuff typically especially in a bull run.”
  3. “I could borrow something against it and then go use that to make yields.”

 

 

 

Investing in DeFi: A Guide for Beginners

In today’s lesson, we will explore how to invest $10,000 or less in decentralized finance (DeFi). This guide outlines essential strategies for maximizing investments in DeFi while highlighting critical concepts from both traditional finance and the crypto world. Understanding these principles is paramount, especially as DeFi continues to disrupt traditional financial systems.

With this knowledge, newcomers can embark on their crypto journey with confidence while potentially benefiting from an evolving and dynamic financial landscape.

Core Concepts

  1. Decentralized Finance (DeFi):

    • Traditional Finance: Refers to financial services conducted through centralized intermediaries such as banks and financial institutions.
    • Crypto Context: DeFi refers to blockchain-based financial services that operate without intermediaries, allowing users to lend, borrow, and trade assets directly on the blockchain.
    • Importance: Familiarity with DeFi is essential as it represents a fundamental shift in how financial transactions can occur.
  2. Collateral:

    • Traditional Finance: Collateral is an asset pledged by a borrower to secure a loan.
    • Crypto Context: In DeFi, collateral can be crypto assets locked in a smart contract to back loans, allowing users to borrow against their holdings.
    • Importance: Understanding collateral is crucial for leveraging investment positions safely.
  3. Stablecoins:

    • Traditional Finance: These are fiat-pegged instruments maintaining a stable value relative to a specific currency.
    • Crypto Context: Stablecoins, like USDC and USDT, minimize the volatility commonly associated with cryptocurrencies, providing a reliable store of value within DeFi platforms.
    • Importance: Knowledge of stablecoins aids in cash management while investing in crypto.
  4. Yield Farming:

    • Traditional Finance: Income-generating investments through interest or dividends are similar to yield farming.
    • Crypto Context: Yield farming involves providing liquidity to DeFi protocols in exchange for interest or rewards, potentially increasing investment returns.
    • Importance: This practice can significantly enhance returns but requires understanding risks.
  5. Bull Run Bag:

    • Traditional Finance: A portfolio comprised of high-potential growth assets in anticipation of market uptrends.
    • Crypto Context: A bull run bag is a strategic collection of crypto assets expected to appreciate during market rallies.
    • Importance: Identifying potential bull run assets is vital for capitalizing on market momentum.
  6. Loan-to-Value (LTV) Ratio:

    • Traditional Finance: The LTV ratio gauges a loan’s risk by comparing the total amount of a secured loan to the appraised value of the asset.
    • Crypto Context: In the DeFi space, LTV is crucial for determining how much one can borrow against collateral without becoming over-leveraged.
    • Importance: New investors should understand this metric to avoid liquidation risks.
  7. Liquidation:

    • Traditional Finance: The process of converting an asset into cash, often through sale or auction, to pay off debts.
    • Crypto Context: In DeFi lending, liquidation occurs when the value of a borrower’s collateral falls below a preset threshold, prompting the sale of those assets to cover the loan.
    • Importance: Awareness of liquidation processes can help mitigate risks in leveraged trading.

Key Steps for Investing in DeFi

1. Defining Your Strategy

  • Identify Goals: Establish financial objectives and risk tolerance.
  • Capital Usage: If $10,000 is your starting capital, decide how much will be allocated toward each strategy.

Crypto Connection: In the DeFi context, outfit your strategies to protect against volatility while actively growing your portfolio as market conditions change.

2. Choosing Your Assets

  • Focus on Big Caps: Invest a significant portion (30-40%) in well-established cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH).
  • Explore Mid and Small Caps: As you get comfortable, consider allocating around 20% to mid-cap or small-cap assets that may yield higher returns.

Crypto Connection: Understanding correlations between assets can help identify which coins may perform well together during market shifts.

3. Leveraging Collateral

  • Use Assets as Collateral: Consider lending your invested assets on a DeFi platform like Aave or Compound.
  • Borrow Against Collateral: Utilize the borrowed funds to invest in other opportunities without needing to sell your initial assets.

Crypto Connection: This method maximizes potential gains while allowing for ongoing asset appreciation, a unique feature of DeFi that traditional finance often lacks.

4. Managing Your Portfolio

  • Hands-On Approach: Early in your investing journey, manage your assets yourself. Each percentage point of return is crucial at this level!
  • Automate with Growth: As your portfolio expands, consider automating some aspects to save time and effort.

Crypto Connection: Tailoring your involvement to your portfolio size is vital. Even small distinctions in percentages can lead to significant outcomes as you grow.

5. Continuous Learning

  • Educate Yourself: Engage with community discussions and resources to expand your cryptocurrency knowledge and adapt strategies.
  • Stay Updated: Ensure you’re informed about new projects and market dynamics that can impact your investments.

Crypto Connection: Keeping pace with an evolving DeFi landscape maximizes your chances of finding lucrative and novel investment opportunities.

Examples

While specific charts or graphs weren’t included in the transcript, visual aids relevant for this lesson could include:

  • Pie charts illustrating diversification strategies (big caps, mid caps, stablecoins).
  • Flowcharts depicting the steps of lending, borrowing, and reinvesting in DeFi.

Hypothetical Examples

  1. Traditional Investing Scenario: Assume you invest $10,000 in a diversified portfolio of stocks yielding a 6% annual return. Your growth is steady but limited.

    Crypto Equivalent: Alternatively, you could channel that same $10,000 into a balanced DeFi portfolio, potentially staking in stablecoins for liquidity while leveraging blue-chip cryptocurrencies. Returns could skyrocket during a bull run, eventually outperforming your stock investment.

  2. Collateral Use: Picture borrowing against your home to invest in other properties. In crypto, this translates to utilizing $10,000 worth of Ethereum as collateral to borrow stablecoins, which you then stake for yield farming, effectively allowing you to earn from two fronts.

  3. Bear vs. Bull: In a declining market, traditional assets may face slowdowns. If your DeFi portfolio is substantially weighted with stablecoins, you can weather market dips and reinvest when prices stabilize, maintaining a higher potential for growth than simply holding cash.

Real-World Applications

  • Historical trends demonstrate the advantages of employing a DeFi strategy, showcasing substantial profits during previous market bull runs.

    • For example, several DeFi investors reported remarkable returns after the 2020 crypto market resurgence, with portfolios surged by over 300%.
  • By emphasizing strategic positioning in blue-chip assets, crypto investments can outperform traditionally managed portfolios during favorable market conditions.

Cause and Effect Relationships

  • Investment Decisions: If you decide to hold a major market position (like Bitcoin), it allows you to create a solid basis for leveraging your gains. Similarly, if you take out too much leverage without sufficient collateral, you risk liquidation in volatile conditions.

  • Market Cycle Impacts: When a bull market occurs, assets may appreciate significantly, leading to increased lending and borrowing activities in DeFi ecosystems, impacting liquidity pools.

Challenges and Solutions

  • Low Yields: Traditional lending rates may not be sufficient for attracting long-term DeFi investors.

    • Crypto Solution: Explore innovative yield farming opportunities, which can offer better returns compared to standard savings options.
  • Liquidation Risk: Newcomers often misunderstand their collateral and LTV ratios.

    • Addressing Misconceptions: Education regarding how to calculate and manage LTV ratios will help safeguard assets from liquidation in a downturn.

Key Takeaways

  1. Understand DeFi: Recognition of how DeFi diverges from traditional finance is essential for effective investing.
  2. Use Collateral Wisely: Leverage your assets strategically to maximize investment potential while managing risk.
  3. Diversify Smartly: Balance investments between big caps, stablecoins, and speculative assets to capitalize on various market conditions.
  4. Stay Engaged: Participating in educational forums and discussions ensures you remain updated and agile in your investment strategy.
  5. Avoid Over-Leveraging: Know your limits to prevent liquidation; always calculate LTV ratios before borrowing.
  6. Focus on Learning: Seize opportunities to deepen your understanding of DeFi systems and strategies, enhancing your investment acumen.
  7. Engage with the Community: Take advantage of community resources for continuous growth in your understanding and skills.

Discussion Questions and Scenarios

  1. How would traditional asset management strategies differ if applied to a DeFi portfolio?
  2. In what ways can collateral protect investments in DeFi compared to traditional lending systems?
  3. Compare the impact of market cycles on traditional investments versus DeFi assets.
  4. Consider a time when a take-profit strategy might save more than a buy-and-hold strategy in crypto. How does this parallel traditional finance?
  5. What are the benefits and trade-offs of leveraging assets in DeFi compared to traditional loans?
  6. Discuss potential risks in DeFi that new investors should be aware of before jumping in.
  7. How can market volatility present opportunities for both traditional and crypto investments?

Glossary

  • Decentralized Finance (DeFi): A movement to create financial services without intermediaries, utilizing blockchain technology.
  • Collateral: An asset utilized to secure a loan, allowing for borrowing without selling the underlying asset.
  • Stablecoins: Cryptocurrencies intended to maintain a stable value relative to a fiat currency, allowing users to engage with blockchain while mitigating volatility.
  • Yield Farming: The practice of earning returns by investing or providing liquidity to DeFi platforms, often reward-driven.
  • Bull Run Bag: A strategic investment in high-potential assets in anticipation of market growth.
  • Loan-to-Value (LTV) Ratio: A financial term used to express the ratio between the amount borrowed and the value of the asset securing the loan.
  • Liquidation: The conversion of an asset into cash to satisfy outstanding debts when the collateral value drops below a specific threshold.

By integrating traditional finance concepts with innovative crypto strategies, this lesson seeks to equip newcomers with the necessary knowledge to embark confidently into the world of DeFi.

Continue to Next Lesson

As your journey into decentralized finance deepens, continue with the next lesson in the Crypto Is FIRE (CFIRE) training program to expand your understanding and strategies for successful investing in this revolutionary space.

 

 

Read Video Transcript
How to Make Money with Crypto DeFi for Beginners!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eo5227bMuh4
Transcript:
 This video is a mini crypto DeFi course for beginners. We’re going to go deep into what  DeFi is and how people use it to earn extra yield on their investments. I’ve got many sections in  this course, so I’ll link them all as timestamps in the description below. We’re going to go step  by step through the three main pillars of DeFi.
 I’m going to explain what they are, how people  actually use them, and then some of the risks and yields that you can expect on these platforms as well. To keep this course as simple and understandable as possible I’ve got many other  specific guides for platforms and tutorials that I’m going to reference throughout this video so  everything that I mention in this video it will be linked in the description so you can get some  more specific step-by-step guides on how to do that.
 Everything will be laid out for you and  I’ll reference those throughout the video. Also we have an investor course as well. As you can see here  there’s over 200 videos on crypto step-by-step from the beginning. You know I’m a previous  financial advisor so I put all of my experience with you know the real financial world into crypto  and how to relate that to cryptocurrency in terms of trading short term,  investing long term, how to use DeFi. My strategies and my portfolio are in the community as well.
 And we’ve got thousands of people in there that talk about their strategies and investing. So if  you do want to check that out, I’ll link that in the description as well. So with using DeFi,  we can split the crypto world up into three layers that we need to know about. The first one is blockchains.
 There are many different blockchains, but they aim to do  more or less the same thing. And we’re looking at smart contract blockchains here. Smart contracts  are what enable decentralized finance because DeFi is literally just using code to enshrine  a contract. So when you go into a contract with someone else, whether you’re  lending or exchanging something or trying to get fees from other people’s trading, then that  contract between you and them has to be enshrined in code because both of you don’t know each other.
 In any case, smart contract chains are what we want to use for decentralized finance. And there  are many chains and each of them potentially have different assets on their different platforms and different applications and  different types of yields and risk profiles as well these are the main ones  you’ve got aetherium polygon matic BNB coin right here avalanche cardano that’s  the theorem that’s matic so I’ll go through some of these throughout the  video there are different chains some of them have better yields than others
 and higher fees than others,  but they’re the blockchains that we’re gonna use.  Now built on top of those blockchains,  you have applications.  Applications are the thing that let me link up  with some random person that I don’t know across the world  and enter into a financial contract with assets, right? And so those  applications are built with code, so we can’t dupe each other and, you know, kind of mug the other  guy, right? So there’s two main types of applications that exist on blockchains right now.
 The first one is an exchange, and the second one is lending. In finance, literally 90% of what you  do, maybe even 100 100 is literally exchanging something  or lending something to someone else so with lending there’s two types there’s two sides of  that you can borrow money because you need that to buy something and then you pay an interest or you  can actually lend assets out to earn interest from borrowers. And DeFi lets us be both of those things.
 On exchanges, and this is the really great thing as well,  you can be both sides as well.  So usually in TradFi,  if you wanna exchange something like a currency,  you have to use an application  and they will charge you a fee.  Well, with decentralized finance,  you can put your assets onto the exchange  and actually earn trading fees  from other people. This is a massive benefit and advance in finance in general.
 And it’s really  amazing that we can now earn fees from other people by providing our assets. Then the third  layer obviously is assets. Smart contract chains can put pretty much any asset on top. So you have something like  USDC or USDT that is a dollar stable coin.
 So that is exactly the same as trading or lending dollars  and you can do that on many different chains. Now Bitcoin isn’t a smart contract chain but you can  actually create wrapped versions of Bitcoin which is here, and put it on these smart contract chains.  Therefore, you have your exposure to Bitcoin,  but you can use it in decentralized finance  in different ways.
 And then of course, each blockchain has its own token,  like this one, which is BNB coin.  And each blockchain will have their specific token  that you can use and invest in if you want,  if you feel it’s a good investment,  and then use DeFi on top of that chain to maybe get some extra yields.
 There are three areas of DeFi that I’m going to  cover in this video, staking, exchanging, and lending. That’s really the majority of what you  can do with financial products. For each of these, there are stages where you can potentially take  more risk to earn a higher reward, but there are also things you can do to earn a higher reward but there are also things you can do to earn a higher reward  without taking too much more risk just because of the way the market works right you want to take  advantage of the yields and the trading that’s happening in the markets so firstly with staking
 you can just do a standard staking smart contracts and proof of stake chains pay staking rewards so  you can just do that in a standard way and earn the staking. There’s liquid staking, which is a step above that. And that enables you to use DeFi  and do things like yield farming.
 As you can see, yield farming is a common theme for every single  type of thing you can do in DeFi because yield farming is really the peak where you are taking  advantage of assets and yields that you can get from around the market. Now on exchanges, you can do something called providing liquidity or being  an LP or an LP-ing.
 And this is something where you put your assets onto an exchange and earn  trading fees. And then obviously advantage from that is you can yield farm as well to get the most.  From lending, you can do standard lending, which is just taking an asset that you have,  letting someone else borrow it  and charging them an interest rate.  And some platforms will pay you incentives as well.
 And so you can yield farm those.  If you wanna interact with DeFi and applications,  you’re gonna need a wallet to do this.  You need to take self custody of your assets,  that is take them off of an exchange  and put them in your own wallet  that can interact with those applications.
 people use metamask that is the most used this  is an evm compatible wallet evm chains include ethereum binance smart chain avalanche polygon  matic and a few others as well so you can use them all within the same wallet and you just add those  in again if you need tutorials for all of these wallets  and everything, everything linked in the description.
 Coinbase wallet is also a very popular choice.  You just go to the websites here, you download the wallet.  They’re completely free, they don’t cost anything,  but you do have to get assets onto them,  obviously, to begin with.  Each chain has different fees as well.  So Ethereum is way more expensive as a chain,  but it’s got many  different scaling solutions that essentially you can use ethereum applications on cheaper chains  there are other chains that are competitors that have cheaper fees as well but they may not have
 the same security and so it’s always a trade-off each blockchain is siloed meaning ethereum has  specific liquidity on there a specific amount of people use  it they have assets on ethereum and the yields that you get and the liquidity that you get the  amount of trading that you get on ethereum is going to be different than matic different than  binance smart chain and so on so each crypto blockchain is siloed in terms of its trading  volumes and everything like that although of course they are competing and you can move assets around from one chain to the other using a bridge.
 Although I don’t recommend that, I actually just use exchanges.  Exchanges are centralized, but they provide the absolute best service in terms of, you know, putting actual fiat currency onto those lowest trading fees.  And I use them as bridges to put crypto in  one and then get it from a different chain.
 So as I said, Coinbase Wallet and Metamask,  we actually have some deposit bonuses as well. Check the links in the description for this.  You can get deposit bonuses if you’re new on these exchanges. They’re really good exchanges.  I use these and the deposit bonuses are just a bonus anyway. If you don’t know how to use exchanges,  links in description to free tutorials.
 We also have a trading guide in the investor course,  which has scores of videos  about how to specifically trade, enter into trades  and get the best prices for your trades as well.  So link in description if you wanna check that out.  Step one then to earning yield is staking.  Staking is something that proof of stake blockchains pay out in terms of an incentive.
 It’s actually a disincentive as well if you don’t do it  and I explain why that is the case. Proof of stake blockchains pay rewards to stakers. If you have a  proof of stake asset then there are yields that you should be getting by staking and if you’re  not doing that you are falling behind other people that are getting those rewards.
 Staking rewards should come from fees paid on the chain, right? So think  of a smart contract blockchain as a platform like Apple or Microsoft, and they have applications  that charge fees to users. Every time a transaction goes through, people pay a small fee.  And as an investor, those fees can get paid back to you via staking rewards. The problem is  though is that we have to look at real yield right and real yield is something that is quite rare in  crypto right now and I’ll explain why that is but staking rewards are something that’s definitely  important. We need to come on to inflation and what this is in terms of its relation to staking
 rewards. So as an example we’ve got Cardano ADA here which is in terms of its relation to staking rewards so as an example  we’ve got cardano ada here which is a proof of stake blockchain and it pays a few percent in  staking rewards i’ve just got it as three percent here um just to show you so let’s say you have  cardano ada and it’s paying you three percent in staking rewards that means every year you’re  getting three percent more tokens in your wallet which is great and that  seems like a bonus and that seems like an incentive right so you are a person here and you get three
 percent more in your wallet every year so you feel like you’re three percent better off the problem  is is that kadano the blockchain is paying out all of those tokens to everyone else in the chain as  well right and everyone else is getting 3%.  So are you actually better off? Well, it depends where the staking rewards are coming from.
 As you can see down here, the piggy bank, let’s say you have $1,000 and there’s two people that  own one share each of the piggy bank. They both have $500 in terms of that share. Each of these shares is worth $500, right?  And the piggy bank is worth $1,000.  Well, what happens if you just give everyone one more share each, right?  So I’ve now got two shares and he’s got two shares as well.
 We’ve now got more shares or more tokens.  And so we feel better off.  We’ve got more.  But the piggy bank hasn’t changed.  So actually what’s happened is that each of these shares is halved in value. tokens and so we feel better off we’ve got more but the piggy bank hasn’t changed so actually  what’s happened is that each of these shares is halved in value now each share is 250 and your  total uh your total value is still 500 so handing out tokens for free is not a yield it is not a  yield you’re just you have the same size pie you’ve just got more smaller slices of it right
 so you’ve just increased the amount of slices so the way that real yield is paid is if a token  doesn’t have any what’s known as inflation inflation is when the protocol creates new  tokens out of nowhere to give to people as an incentive as as you can see here. It’s actually not an incentive, it’s a disincentive.
 It actually punishes people for not staking.  The reason is, is because stake is really important  with blockchains in terms of validating transactions  and making sure it’s decentralized.  So this is a cost for the blockchain  and your stake is getting diluted if you are not staking.  What you really wanna see with any crypto,  Cardano was an example,  and I’ve got the emission schedule here for Cardano.
 Look at your crypto,  whether it’s Binance Chain or anything or Ethereum.  What you really want is real yield.  So you don’t want the creation of new coins  to pay staking rewards because that is not an actual yield.  What you want want as you can  see here with kadano and every blockchain is different at the beginning the inflation was  very high but over time the inflation has tailed off now as of making this video kadano inflation  is like a few percent it’s like two percent maybe something like that and Cardano has a hard cap on its supply of 45 billion coins. After that,
 no more coins will be issued and all staking rewards will come from blockchain profits.  That’s very good. So don’t get your head turned by a crypto that has like 50% staking rewards,  because guess what? They’ll be paying that out of the creation of new coins and that’s not real  yield. You’re not getting any benefit from that whatsoever.
 Some considerations then when staking,  these things you definitely want to keep in mind. Staking provides rewards for blockchain participants,  but it also is detrimental if you don’t do it. That’s the whole point of staking. It’s supposed  to be a detriment if you don’t do it, because they want you to stake to secure their blockchain.  detriment if you don’t do it because they want you to stake to secure their blockchain. Staking is paid via remissions initially.
 All new chains have to pay via remissions because no one’s using them  and they have to incentivize or actually, you know, disincentivize people to go somewhere else.  Staking yields in the future should all come via transactions and smart contract fees.  Otherwise, it’s not real yield. Staking rewards only pay when the token emissions are under the  staking yield right so the only time you actually are making real yield is when the staking yield  from fees is above the token emissions ideally token emissions will be zero or negative there  can be negative because you can actually use fees to burn tokens as well so look for real yield it’s
 a very simple calculation. How many  tokens are in existence? How many are getting issued over time? You can check this out on  sites like CoinGecko as well. Think of staking as like getting paid dividends from the business that  is the blockchain, right? So you want very low issuance of coins and some staking rewards from  actual profits.
 If you want specific guides on staking, how to get coins in wallets and staking on the blockchain, all of those I’ll link  in the description for you. We also have a tokenomics section that goes through what tokenomics  are, what are good and bad versions of it and what I think of them as well. So check that out if you  want. Now we want to get onto liquid staking. Liquid staking is the next stage of staking.  Now we want to get onto liquid staking.
 Liquid staking is the next stage of staking.  This is when you use providers,  decentralized providers and smart contracts to up the staking game and get some benefits to yourself.  So I explained some of the pros and cons  and what that is now.  Liquid staking is when you use a provider  and they give you a separate coin  that represents your stake that  accrues staking rewards and that has some benefits.
 The downside of staking is that most of the time  you get locked up anywhere from around three days, maybe nine days or 21 days. That means that your  capital is tied up. That’s really not good because the capital that is tied up is dead capital. You can’t  use it for anything else. That’s not great.
 You also are tied up, which means if you want to sell  for some reason, you have to wait 21 days for the thing to unlock. Now that is not good, right? So  that’s just something that we need to get around in some way. Staking downside also is that it has  a fairly low yield and you can’t do  anything to increase that yield the yield is paid out by the blockchain um you know and that is the  the normal way but you can’t do anything you can’t use them in any way and you can’t use them on defy  now it is not the case for every blockchain for example with kadano they actually don’t have this
 this is because the way they design their staking protocol, you can have ADA, the token in your wallet, and you can use it across DeFi. There’s no lockups  or anything like that. And so that’s great for that chain. But for EVM chains, most of them have  this issue where there’s a lockup and your capital is dead sitting on the chain.
 So that’s why we,  or that’s why the DeFi world has created a solution for this known as liquid staking.  A liquid staking provider is a project and a team that creates a product where you use them and their smart contracts.  You can stake your coin and they give you the staking rewards and another coin that you can use.
 There’s no lockup and you can trade it.  LSD providers take a percent fee for  this usually around 10 percent right so they will do this for you you get some benefits they take  10 percent of the staking rewards overall though you might still be better off doing this because  you can use it across DeFi.
 These rely on smart contracts to stake your tokens and there are some  risks with that of course you have to trust this liquid staking provider whereas with direct staking you’re only trusting the blockchain how do liquid  staking derivatives work sounds complex but it’s actually really simple right if you think about it  you’re an investor and you have a coin and you want to stake it what you could do initially is  just take your coin get it into the wallet and then stake it on the blockchain, choose a validator, and they’ll pay you 5%, right?  Whatever it is.
 So that’s really simple.  No one’s in the middle.  It’s pretty much as secure as you’re gonna get  within the blockchain world, right?  But it’s locked up for nine days  in the case of Polygonmatic, I think, right?  So there’s some downside here.  So we’re gonna use a liquid staking provider like Lido. They’re definitely the number one. You there’s some downside here.
 So we’re going to use a liquid staking provider  like Lido. They’re definitely the number one. You can actually see them here and you can stake a few  assets on here. Ethereum, Solana, Polygon, Polkadot, right? So what we do is we say,  we’re going to give Lido our token and we’re going to let you stake it for us. They go ahead  and stake it on the blockchain.
 They’re locked up for nine days, right? They get the 5%  rewards. So good for them. Now they take 10% of that 5% as a fee for their, you know, for their  work. But what they do is they give you this token, which is this staked Matic. It also works  for staked Ethereum, staked Solana, right? It’s all the same. You get  this token that accrues the rest of those rewards. So everything that’s left over, 4.
5% or 7% or  whatever it may be on the chain, you get all that into your wallet, but you get this kind of new  token called Stakedmatic, which is not the same thing and it’s totally liquid it accrues staking  rewards so your rewards are paid to you but you have this new token in your wallet that you can  trade immediately online right so i’ve got some tutorials on using lido and staking so again  linked in description if you want more specific guides so what you do is you go on to stake now  you need to use a wallet put your
 ethereum or your matic in there stake it and then you get this liquid staking token a competitor to  lido is called stada they do it with all of these coins as you can see here the most popular is  polygon and bnb it’s the same thing you get something called x an x token right so it’s a  it’s a matic x it’s a bnb X and so that accrues staking rewards to you  but you have that token in your wallet right there that you can trade instantly so instead of going  right onto Polygon this would be the normal way you stake so you log in you choose a validator
 you don’t do any of that you just go onto these profiles right here and stake through them and  they send you the staking token into your wallet right away.  Why that’s important is because you can trade it instantly on the market.  So you get instant liquidity, which is why they’re known as liquid staking derivatives.
 So for example, you don’t even have to use Stata or Lido because the liquid staking derivative  tokens are out in the market and so you can just buy them  directly you don’t even need to use these protocols so as you can see here you have matic let’s say  you have matic you want to swap that into matic x so you’ve gone from a token that is matic that  is not getting any rewards from staking now you’ve got matic x which accrues those staking rewards  in your wallet but as you can see you can trade it directly on a decentralized exchange in and out as you want and getting those rewards if you have
 the token. If you want to know how to use decentralized exchanges and how they actually  work under the hood all of those videos are in the crypto investor course. We go really into how  DEXs operate and some of the ways that you can earn extra on them. I’ll cover some of that in this video as well.
 But with liquid staking, there are strategies that you can use now because you have  a token that is completely free to use across DeFi and accrues rewards. And so there’s many  other ways you can earn yield on that. So using liquid staking, you can use it on DeFi apps,  which we’re going to go through in this video. You can earn staking rewards and other fees on DeFi.
 For example, if you use exchanges to earn other people’s fees,  so you’re upping your yield here. Now there’s upped risk as well, because the more smart contracts  to use, the more platforms to use, you’re just entering more and more trust into it at that time.  So people can make decisions on if they want to do that and earn extra yield or not.  trust into it at that time. So people can make decisions on if they want to do that and earn extra yield or not.
 Yield farming platforms, and you can use exchanges as well to boost your yield,  right? So we’re actually right into DeFi right now. We’ll cover this in the LPN strategies. So  the next strategy is liquid staking strategies or yield farming. We’re actually going to cover  that in the next section, which is using exchanges because it fits in really well so let’s get on to exchanges then how people use them and how you can use these to  actually increase your yield and earn passive income from the assets you hold exchanges are  on every platform so like i said you have the blockchain then you have applications on each
 blockchain some applications are cross-chain meaning that it’s the same app but you can use  many different chains some are native to each you know blockchain for now but they may be cross-chain, meaning that it’s the same app, but you can use many different chains. Some are native to each blockchain for now, but they may be cross-chain in the future.
 So trusted decentralized exchanges we can use on different chains. So Avalanche has Trader Joe,  that’s kind of the native DEX on there. BNB chain has PancakeSwap, that’s the biggest DEX.  Matic or Polygon Network has QuickSwap right here and on Ethereum you have Curve but you also  have some other exchanges like Uniswap as well. So we can look at all of these exchanges.
 Now each  chain has you know the best exchange and there are obviously leading exchanges out there. It’s  pretty easy to find them. Decentralized Exchange, Uniswap, Curve and these ones right here. And you  can use these to trade but you can also use these to provide  your coins up as liquidity to earn extra fees so this is how LPN works very simply I’ve got extra  guides on this that I’ll link in the description that go through it if you want kind of a more  in-depth overview here is what LPN is or providing liquidity you have tokens that you want to earn a
 yield from so you have BNB coin and you have US dollar tether and you want to earn a yield from. So you have BNB coin and you have US dollar  tether, and you want to earn fees on these from traders so that you can actually earn extra  income. So what you do is you put both of these coins onto PancakeSwap.
 From there, PancakeSwap  is a decentralized exchange. So if someone has BNB and they want to sell it for US  dollar tether because they want to sell out and get some dollars, they’ll put this coin onto  PancakeSwap. They’ll put it. So you put yours in with many other people. So there’s a big pool of  assets right here that’s all slumping around. Right.
 And so this person on the right hand side,  they’ll put their BNB in and they’ll get some US dollar tether out,  right? USDT. And they pay a fee for that. That is a transaction. That’s a trade, right? They put one  coin in, they take one coin out. Because they traded, they pay a fee, right? Whatever that may  be, let’s call it half a percent, right? Now on a centralized exchange like Binance or Bybit,  they take all of that and that’s their profits.
 On a decentralized exchange,  some of it goes towards the token and you can invest in the token of the exchange if you want,  but some of it actually goes back to you because you provided liquidity. So you’ve got tokens on  the exchange and when people pay fees, those fees are passed back to you some of them anyway and so that’s how you earn  extra yield on tokens that you have by providing liquidity i’ve got specific guides on each of  these exchanges about how to provide liquidity and everything like that so i won’t go through
 that in this video but it’s something you can do and provide liquidity to earn staking rewards  there’s a lot to do there’s definitely a lot to discuss here. There’s  risks to this, especially if two of the assets are not the same price. So I’ll go through that  in a second. But what we want is impermanent loss. We want to discuss this.
 Impermanent loss is  something that happens on decentralized exchanges because of the way that the algorithms are made.  And so I’ve got specific guides on this that i go through in much more detail  but here’s what you need to know the when you uh deposit two assets especially if they are not of  the same price so bnb coin is a risk asset and it’s going to change in price over time compared  to us dollar tether because it that, you might suffer from something  called impermanent loss. If there’s a change in price from when you deposit those two tokens
 to when you take them out of the pool, which there might be if they’re two risk assets that  move in price, you will lose money if you withdraw the assets in comparison to what you would have  made if you didn’t provide the liquidity. So that may kind of  you know not make sense but hopefully this graph shows you that if you put two assets on at a  specific price between them so let’s say BNB coin is 300 US dollar tether.
 If you put them in at that  ratio and take them out of that ratio there’s no impermanent loss as you can see here 100  if the ratio of those assets in the pool changes over time so that maybe the ratio is different now  because one bnb is 500 us dollars and not 300 when those prices move you start making impermanent loss  now impermanent loss is something you have to deal with with risk assets.
 So what we have to say is the total profit that we make is all the  money that we make from trading fees which can definitely rack up minus any  potential impermanent loss if we withdraw our assets from the pool and  that is ultimately our profit. Now what can happen is the price can change a lot  and then maybe come back to the same  ratio as that when you put them in. If you take them out there’s no impermanent loss.
 That’s why  it’s called impermanent loss because the price can change and you only make it permanent when  you withdraw the assets from the pool. So that might be quite a complex topic. I’ll have a  specific video guide linked in the description there on terms of how that works.  But it’s something to be aware of.
 Now, the way to get round impermanent loss is to not put any risk assets that have different potential prices into a pool. So if you want to provide liquidity on something like PancakeSwap, you can also do it on Trader Joe.  You can see pools right here and you can put these assets in.  Like I said, I’ve got specific guides on actually doing that.
 But let’s say you want to provide liquidity, go over to  liquidity here and you can choose any assets that you put in the pool, right? You can choose any  assets that you want. Well, impermanent loss only happens when assets change in price. What happens  if both of these assets are actually just the same price? So’ll choose busd and then we’ll choose usdt  now these are two stable coins right they’re both pegged at one dollar each and so they’re not going  to change in price they might change like 0.
011 you know zero zero one percent or something right  but they’re not going to change a lot and so there is no impermanent loss because BUSD is a stable coin that’s pegged at a dollar  and so is USDT. So they’re both a dollar and there’s no impermanent loss but people trade  these assets all the time and you can earn your fees and not worry about impermanent loss.
 So  impermanent loss is something that only happens with risk assets and as you can see here the LP  reward APR is 1.22% so that’s better than you’re getting in a bank right now,  just providing these assets on here  and earning trading fees.  So that is something that you can do,  especially with assets that don’t change  in the price that they have to each other, right?  So that’s very good.
 Also on exchanges as well,  you have something called LP incentives.  These platforms are very new right now. And so all of them mostly pay an incentive for you to use them versus their competitor.  The way that they do that is giving you some of the platform token.  PancakeSwap has the cake tokens worth about a billion dollars in general.
 The token, you know, this one, Trader Joe has a token,  Curve has a token, they all have a token,  and they pay out that token as a incentive  for you to use them.  So you get extra rewards on top.  On PancakeSwap, what you do is go to earn and then farms.  So if you’re a liquidity provider,  you can get extra yield in the form of cake tokens  to boost your yield, to incentivize you to use this  as you can see here as you can see here the apr changes per pool and everything like that but you  can do that here’s how incentive tokens work again we have busd and usdt so we’re providing
 liquidity there and we’re getting getting 0.5 percent you know from fees or whatever it is so  that’s really good and on the right hand side  you’re now getting extra rewards for farming so what pancakes what will do is take uh your the  amount that you have on the platform it knows this because of the smart contracts they give you what’s  known as an lp token this is an lp token right here liquidity provider token that represents  it’s like a receipt for what  you put on the decks. So they know exactly how much you have and knowing how much you have,
 they’ll give you this as a reward, right? So this is extra tokens. Let’s say you get 25%  more from what you’ve put on the platform. And as you can see here, the APR is 27%. It’s actually  boosted up to 44% now, right? And so that is a way to earn extra yield by  providing liquidity.
 It’s not just getting these staking or these LP rewards, but you earn extra  from LP incentives as well. And this is what is known as yield farming. Before we get into yield  farming, like I said, when you put two assets into a liquidity pool on a DEX like this one,  and both of them have a very similar price that doesn’t change,  you don’t suffer impermanent loss or the impermanent loss is so low that it’s not  worth worrying about.
 You can do that with stable coins, but you can also do it with liquid staking  derivatives. Remember, an LSD or a liquid staking derivative is a token that represents your stake  and accrues staking rewards over time. So what happens when you have a liquid staking derivative that’s going to be valued at,  we’ll do this at, you know, 45 cents, and then you have the actual token which is also valued at 45  cents.
 There’s no impermanent loss there because they both are essentially the same token with one accruing  staking rewards they have the same price and so you can provide liquidity onto the native decks  when people change from one to the other they pay a fee that fee goes back to you so you’re  earning staking rewards from this one you’re earning fees from this one and you’re earning staking rewards from this one, you’re earning fees from this one, and you’re earning LP rewards as well from this token if they pay it to you.
 That is layering yields on top of  each other. One thing to note here is that doing this increases risk because you’ve got this smart  contract, you’ve got this smart contract, you’ve got this smart contract. So smart contracts and  platforms, every time you you know you layer  that on there are more potential risks you have to be really sure about um you know smart contracts  they have to be audited and everything like that but there is extra risk one other thing to note  is that you’re wondering if this is occurring staking rewards why is the price not going up
 yes it does actually go up this goes up by about 5% per year because that’s the staking rewards on that token.  So over time, this token will actually move away  from the normal token here by 5% a year  because it’s accruing rewards.  And so the way that Stakesmatic accrues rewards  is by actually just becoming more expensive as a token, right?  So they just put the new tokens in the pool  and then that actually goes up in value.
 So that 5% though is not going to give you  hardly any impermanent loss whatsoever.  And it’s more than paid for by using,  you know, these yield farming strategies.  Now, some other tokens like staked Ethereum  don’t accrue value to the token.  And so the price doesn’t change at all.  What they do is rebase the token which is actually just give you more tokens and so each token is the  same price but if you accrue staking rewards you have more of those tokens and the balance updates  in your wallet. Each token is a little different so definitely understand if your token is a rebase
 token or a non-rebase token,  you have to understand the intricacies of each of these tokens before getting involved.  And hopefully that explains why staking  and then liquid staking, earning yield on DeFi  can up the yields that you’re getting  from the same tokens.  Let’s go on to yield farming then.  And you may think, wow, all of this is really complex.
 I’m gonna have to add tokens in get tokens out i’m gonna have to then reinvest the liquidity  provider token incentives because that’s in a token that i don’t want because i don’t want  cake tokens because i actually want to be earning some matic tokens or whatever it is yes that’s  true so obviously with defy there’s products and services that do this automatically through the use of smart contracts.
 And so I’ll explain that right now. Yield farming platforms do all of this automatically through smart contracts.  So I’m going to use Beefy Finance as an example. They’re multi-chain, Binance Smart Chain, all of the EVM chains, as you can see here.  There’s another one as well, which I look at how do they work let’s say you have staked matic and matic and you want to earn the most amount of yield by providing  liquidity on quick swap earning the platform reward tokens to ins to you know up your yield
 but you don’t really want to invest this by the way this is the the LP token. And this LP token accrues incentives in the Matic, the quick swap token.  So you may think to yourself, that’s great.  My yield is boosted, but I’ve just got loads of this random exchange token that I kind of don’t want because I’m invested in Matic.
 And that’s the one I want to accrue more of.  Yes, this is what smart contract chains do.  Sorry, this is what smart contract chains do. Sorry, this is what yield farming platforms do.  So what they attempt to do is automate this entire strategy  and boost the yield in the underlying token that you’re invested in.
 So you can do that or not.  I actually provide liquidity on some exchanges where I earn the exchange token  and actually just keep it because I quite like the exchange  and I think it’s a good product and it’s a profitable business.  And so I’m happy to get those tokens from what I’m doing and keep them as an investment.
 But if you don’t want to, you don’t have to.  You could do all of this manually and go through with the transactions, get the quick swap token,  sell it on the DEX for dollars or MATIC and reinvest it yourself.  But obviously, people don’t have the time  or inclination to do that.  It’s a waste of time, right?  So let’s see how Beefy Finance works.
 We go onto something like Matic chain,  link your wallet up.  Then you can see all of the pools that it has here.  Like I said, pools with high APR  with two risk assets are probably risky.  That’s why the APR is high, right?  So you have to understand the risks there.
 It’s not just choosing the highest APY and saying, well, that’s the best,  because as you can see here, we’ve got ETHMATIC, Ethereum and MATIC tokens. Now they may change in  value, giving you a massive impermanent loss, which completely wipes away the apy apy is usually high for a reason you don’t get high apy  with low risk high apy means oh that’s risky so just ignore it essentially that’s that would what  being what i would do anyway so what you want to see here is i’ve got let’s say for example  staked matic and i can see this is staked matic and matic this is a liquidity pool and you can
 see here that the exchange is  called Dystopia. And there’s actually a boost going on now as well. So even more yield farming.  Right. So what they do on this strategy, I’m going to use the Curve one here for an example,  Curve, which runs on Polygon. What they do, and they explain the strategy.
 This is not an advert  for beefy or anything like that. I’m not saying this is good to go into i’m just you know explaining how these work definitely do your own  research here but what they do is they take stakesmatic and matic they put it into the curve  pools to earn trading fees and they take curve incentives sell the curve incentives put it back into the strategy and you get a full 14.
44  yield um overall so it breaks down the yield right here you’re getting 8.75 from that strategy which  as i said matic yields about five percent so you’re getting more yield right right here and  for now there’s a boost as well which is lido is actually giving you a boost because they’re  the staking provider and they want you to use them rather than their competitor and so they’re going  to give you some of their LDO tokens as well.
 So that’s how that works right so smart contracts  automate this entire process and you get the full amount of yield back in the token that you want to  be invested in if you want to do that. There are other platforms as well, for example,  Yearn Finance, which is mostly on Ethereum. And a lot of people use the staked Ethereum pool here.  And as you can see, it’s yielding around 4.8% right now. So it breaks down all of the way it gets yield. So it’s actually earning 3.16% from the pool on the exchange.
 There’s a bonus APR that  Curve are paying out.  So that’s yield farming that.  You also have a boost, I think, from Curve as well.  They use Convex as well,  which is another way to actually boost yields  from incentive tokens.  And the net APY overall is 4.81%.  This may or may not be better than you can get elsewhere.  Of course, I’m not saying this platform  is good or bad or whatever.
 A lot of people use these.  So this is the way you go from having one token that’s that’s being staked on the  blockchain or that if you buy the gas token you’re getting zero percent you then go and stake it for  maybe five percent you then go and put it into a liquidity pool in a dex you may be getting another  one percent to bring up to six you’re be getting another 1% to bring up to 6%.
 You’re then farming  incentive tokens to bring that up to something like 7% or more. In the case of MATIC, the actual  incentive now is anywhere from 14% to 20%. So that’s a big difference in terms of passive income  and yield that you’re getting from your investments that’s reinvested back in. I don’t want to also,  what I want to do also is really hammer home that higher yields are there  for a reason because it’s more risky always, always and forever.
 So for example, I would not  use Dystopia as a liquidity exchange or a DEX. It’s too new for me. I always go for DEXs that  I trust and have been around for a while. finance and quick swap are definitely too trusted for me that i would gravitate towards so as with everything in d5 and crypto you have to  consider risk first and yields after that because with high yields is high risk and if you do lose  tokens from a hack or something no amount of yield is going to make up for losing all of your tokens  and hack which does happen so i always want to hammer home do your own research and make your own decision in terms of how much risk you really want
 to be taking the reason why i use defy and try and get yields on my coins is because i understand  the power the very real power of compounding compounding is something that really supercharges  and turbocharges your portfolio i’ve got a specific video in the investor course  called Compounding the Key to Building Wealth.
 Compounding is vital for building wealth over the long term  if you’re invested.  And obviously we wanna make sure  that we have the most safety and the best yield.  So that mix at all times.  Now though, we’re gonna get onto lending,  some of the lending protocols,  how they work and how people use them.  So with lending, it’s very simple.
 In the past, you had two people.  One was a lender that had assets to lend out that wanted a yield.  One was a borrower that wanted to have assets to buy something or to invest and they pay an interest rate.  In the middle, you have a bank which takes 100% of everything. They give the  lender or the saver basically nothing.
 And then they charge tons of fees, you know, 7% on a  mortgage or something, whatever, or 25% on a credit card. They take all of those fees for themselves,  give you nothing. Lending on DeFi is different. You have two people who,  as you can see, they get onto a protocol and they have a direct relationship with each other.  Something like Aave, without a doubt, the leading lending protocol.
 What Aave does is they sit in  the middle and they provide a venue, big liquid venue for Bob and Alice to lend and borrow. Now, if Alice is paying 5% in a fee as an interest  rate to borrow US dollars from Bob, Aave only takes 10% of the interest that they’re paying.  Aave don’t control the interest rate. This is an open market.
 This is an open money market,  Aave don’t control the interest rate.  This is an open market.  This is an open money market, an open lending market where Alice pays interest  based on the supply and demand of that asset.  And Aave’s just sitting in the middle saying,  if you do borrow and you’re paying interest,  we’ll take 10% of that.
 That’s it, 10%.  They’re not charging interest or putting prices up.  It’s supply and demand in the market.  Now you can invest in Aave if you think it’s a good lending protocol.  And the Aave token accrues value because it’s earning 10% in fees.  But for users, for us, you can borrow at a lower rate and you can save at a higher rate.
 So that’s amazing.  And we don’t have banks in the middle.  So here’s how Aave works.  Because you might be  thinking hold on a second I’m lending money to someone online that I don’t know never heard of  don’t know who they are you know don’t know if they’re trustworthy don’t know if they’re going  to pay anything back how on earth am I going to lend money to that person well very simply for  right now at least and it is changing over time with different products, but for right now, all lending on DeFi is what’s known as over collateralized lending.
 A collateral is an asset that you put on the platform that has thousand dollars on here the loan value can only  be 700 bucks if you want to loan dollars against it okay so it’s over  collateralized meaning that you don’t have to trust them because they have a  thousand dollars of aetherium on the platform to back their loan and if the  price of aetherium drops to800, they’re going to start to  get a margin call.
 Now, remember, actually, I’ve just got it down here with the tokens,  which is probably easier. Let’s say you have $1,000 of ETH and they take a loan of $700,  right? Now, are they sitting in the middle? And remember, these are smart contracts  and you can’t change them if the  value of ethereum falls down to 800 bucks this account whoever owns it doesn’t matter this  account because it’s on the blockchain and this ethereum is locked up in ave and they have the  value this account is going to start to get a margin call where the platform says, you don’t  have much value left to pay this $700 loan. And so what will happen is the platform will start
 selling down their Ethereum, right? And so what it will do is it will sell down some of this Ethereum  because it’s now only 800. So you may sell a little bit of Ethereum. And what they do, they sell the Ethereum for dollars and pay back some of this loan. So they  bring the loan down to 600 bucks.
 Why is that good? Well, now you have a buffer, right? So,  you know, maybe the Ethereum is that you have in the account is 700. And, you know, you have 600  left of the loan. If the price falls further down to like 650  you’re going to have to pay more of this loan but the reason why you can trust this is because the  platform has value that backs the loan and if the value of this asset falls in any way the platform  is going to sell out straight away and pay back the loan and so you don’t have to trust the other person,  but that’s how that works.
 And here are all the markets on Aave.  Aave is by far the leading provider.  You have different markets here that you can use it on.  So let’s go to something like the Ethereum market.  Lots of different markets here for different coins,  different blockchains.  And like I said, each blockchain is a siloed liquidity  so you have to look on each chain and you have to go to the markets and you can see what they’re  paying for right now on the avalanche market you’re getting three percent on us dollars and
 you’re getting 25 you know quarter of a percent for wrapped Bitcoin. It’s not a lot, right? So what  you can do is go to a different market. For example, let’s have a look at Polygon. They’re  currently paying 2.35% for US dollars and they’re paying 0.05% for Bitcoin. So definitely Avalanche,  their market is paying more. So you can just lend these out.
 Now, I believe lending to be  somewhat lower risk than most other strategies because it’s a very simple over collateralized  loan that is backed by value. And so as long as you believe that this protocol won’t suffer any  losses from liquidations or issues with liquidations in a downturn, then you should be fine.
 Now, Aave has had some of these in the past,  but very few now.  It’s really, it’s a battle-tested protocol.  And DeFi throughout its history  has shown to be extremely high quality  when it comes to drawdowns.  And we’ve seen centralized companies  get absolutely wrecked during bear markets  because humans are making bad decisions.  Or on here, if a loan is over collateralized, you cannot change that contract.
 And so that’s why  over collateralized lending is seen as quite safe. But you see the APYs aren’t great because of that.  So that’s just something you have to deal with. Now, what you can see as well,  if you go over to the Aalanche market is that avalanche  are paying some some yield incentives right here so for usd coin let’s do tether you’re getting  three percent on tether but you’re also getting almost half a percent as an incentive in the  avalanche token to use this market instead of other markets you might want to go ahead and just
 lend out some ethereum right on the optimism network on Aave and what  you do is you get some Ethereum so you might get let’s say 1% of Ethereum and  you might get a bonus of optimism tokens of you know 1% and you get both of these  tokens in your wallet so you get some Ethereum back and you get some optimism  tokens back as the incentive and Aave is in the middle but of course you can use something like beefy to actually take these op tokens switch them back into ethereum tokens  and so your ethereum yield is higher so again on beefy i’ll show you right here you can go over to
 the optimism market then you want to search for eth if you want to supply ETH, look down here and you’ll see on Aave,  you can use ETH and it gives 3.38%, which is higher than Aave’s paying because it’s taking  those optimism incentives and selling them back to ETH. Again, just look for the strategy,  look for the risks here, if there are any risks in terms of that strategy and how they do that.
 But yield farming is something that you can  use to increase your yields over time. But you do obviously have extra risks and trust assumptions  with different protocols and smart contracts along the way. It is up to the investor to decide how  much risk they’re willing to take to get extra rewards and how much complexity they want to  introduce into their investment strategies. You can stake.
 This is a low technical risk option with the lowest reward.  It’s very reliable and you don’t have to rely on smart contracts or other platforms.  You can then use something like liquid staking derivatives,  which are open to smart contracts and provider risk,  but they can let you have a liquid staking token  that you can go ahead and then use to LP  and earn extra rewards but then you’re introducing more platform risk and smart contract risk here  or you can lend which is actually fairly low risk if you’re just you know lending on
 over collateralized loans basis but it’s usually low yield. And then there are strategies to yield  farm everything, strategies to build on top of each other that give you the most amount of yield,  but then you have the most openness to smart contracts and platform risk, which is a real  risk.
 And so I only use a few protocols that I’ve seen are battle tested, have been around for years  and look to be upstanding for the most part. can never be too sure with these which is why some people are just going to stake if they can and you know and  leave it at that so yeah definitely for staking for wallets for blockchains
 
How to Invest 10K or less into Defi (Crypto Cashflow) – YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ba2wWDMV_Jw
Transcript:
 So this was a requested video on how would I invest $10,000 if that’s all I had.  Wouldn’t be that much different.  I did a video about a week ago on how I would invest and how I do invest hundreds of thousands of dollars.  But the strategy does change the less you have.  And so if you have a smaller amount of capital and that’s all relative,  then maybe this video will be useful to you.
 By the way, these roundtable, these DeFi portfolio roundtable  discussions and the hot seat Q&As inside the UIG, join them. I’m doing a series on lending and  taking on leverage in a safe way. So if you have a smaller amount, you could double or triple your  portfolio or the amount you have to invest without taking on that much risk.
 We’re going to dabble it  on today’s YouTube video,  but it’s probably a 20 or 30 minute conversation with some deeper education behind the scenes to  really get it right. Now, I did this again about a week ago on how I would invest 100k.  The only thing that I would do different in terms of how would I invest a smaller amount,  let’s say $10,000 or less, is I wouldn’t be looking at investing in anything else.
 I wouldn’t really be looking to collect an income that depends on your goals, of course,  but I wouldn’t be looking to take any out. I may sit on stable coins to reinvest, but I wouldn’t  be like paying myself a salary because that’s going to slow down the portfolio growth. But I  would most likely use it as collateral.
‘ll talk about it also with with the bigger  portfolios we talked a lot about big cap like the btcs the eths the lower percentage yields more  hands off more blue chip more stability because a few percentile swings on a big portfolio can  oftentimes emotionally and kind of mentally mess with us because we’ll see the dollar  amount fluctuating for a smaller amount we’ll still do big cap and blue chip stuff typically  especially in a bull run we want to look at correlated pairs that’s not always true just  depending what the market is doing and you may have a 20 30 30, 40% of your portfolio made up in the big cap stuff.
 Then you might have a 20% kind of mid-capper. I’ve got one, it’s a pair with SUI that’s doing 240%. That’s a SUI ETH position. It’s a pretty good play for a portfolio, especially if you’re doing  anything over 100%.
 And there’s correlation between the two and there’s big potential for appreciation i mean  suey went from less than a dollar to over two dollars your portfolio or at least that position  just doubled depending how it’s set up of course then i would maybe look at mid cap to small cap  so we’re going down the list in terms of you know top couple hundred in the coin market cap maybe  there’s some gems in there that are offering you a 400, 300% return,  much more hands-on, and you better know what you’re doing.
 And then don’t be afraid of creating  a bull run bag. Now I know we’re thinking like a DeFi income portfolio, but the bull run bag,  to me, they work really closely together, especially in bullish situations.  Also, what I recommend doing, and again, every portfolio is unique, is a lot of  this we’re going to be harvesting.
 So we’re not necessarily going to be compounding it back into  these positions. And we wouldn’t really be doing lending because the returns are just not enough.  I’ll show you Aave in a second here. We’ll actually take, here on Polygon, I actually have $10,000  for a trading I’m holding inside the UIG,  but we’re just going to do a quick little two minute fun deploying this $10,000 by actually  lending it and then borrowing against it.
 So we can get 15, $16,000 worth of a portfolio  and kind of get free money, so to speak. So I’ll do that in a second here.  I also wouldn’t really talk about spending it. We talked about that in the $100,000. We have  clients who do million dollar portfolios inside FastTrack and we have clients doing $10,000, $50,000,  $100,000, $5,000, $2,000 portfolios in the UIG.
 The smaller your portfolio, I don’t necessarily  recommend spending it. Again, it depends on your personal goals. And I’m speaking generally here,  but it’s just gonna slow down portfolio growth.  Whereas if you have 100,000, multi-hundred, multi-million,  you might wanna spend it.  Pay down your mortgage.  We had a client pay off their car  with the yields they were earning  and they decided to spend it and pay off some debt.
 I am a fan of buying bull run bag with it.  And I am a fan of buying bull run bag with it. And I am a fan of opening new  positions. So it could kind of look like this or this. You’re either growing your bull run bag or  you’re opening new positions.
 Now, if you’re lending, you’re lending it just because you’re  sitting on profits and you’re looking to redeploy. You’re just waiting for the market to do what the  market does. That would be like the biggest change I also wouldn’t automate  with a bigger portfolio you may want to automate with a smaller every percent counts every time  you lock in a permanent loss it really really counts and so we may want to be a little more  hands-on just like any business because this is a business we’re building when you first let me know  in the comments if you started a business also let me know in the comments if you started a business. Also, let me know in the comments if it took a lot of work to start a business.
 At first, if you really want to squeeze out profits, you might have to work on this quite a bit.  And that’s fine.  And the bigger your DeFi business gets, the more hands off you may want to get, the more you want to automate.  But to me, when we’re first starting, every percent counts.  And if you could manually adjust ranges and really set things and really get hands-on with it, you can do really well.
 We’ve got pages and pages of testimonials.  I just posted four on my Instagram story.  Someone did about $3,000 in their first month.  Awesome.  Like 26% or something.  Someone else is doing, I think, a month. And that was within the  first couple of months.
 Like this stuff works, but you’ve got to apply it and you really have  to study it. Now, what I would also do, I’ll do a quick little, I wasn’t planning on doing this,  but I’m going to do it again. Join the round table discussions or simply just like ask in the UIG.  We can always create trainings for you. This. YouTube videos are usually weeks behind what we do in the UIG, just so we’re clear.
 And so if you want the fresh stuff,  if you want the new stuff, if you want to stay on top of what the market is doing, different  projects, different opportunities, actually engage with the team, ask questions, join the Q&As,  join the chats, join the live calls, the UIG is where it’s at but I will share this let’s say you have ten thousand dollars you  could you could especially in a bullish scenario here you know trade that 10 000 USDC for 10 000  worth of Bitcoin maybe there’s something else that you’re bullish on and you see has more potential
 than Bitcoin itself you could swap it over to Bitcoin done bam approve once this is swapped  over there we go so it’s swapped over to ten thousand dollars  ish worth of btc over here on uniswap and again i’m just mimicking what if you already have crypto  assets what if you have bitcoin and you have some eth and you have some other assets maybe you have  polygon you could take it like i did i could go over to the ave just for this scenario here i could supply ten thousand dollars worth of  bitcoin there we go polygon is super freaking slow supply i i spend so much time on base that i’m
 like spoiled i spend a lot of time on base and suey right now so i’m pretty spoiled  but once this is supplied then i can take a loan against it and then go use that so i could borrow  something against it and then go use it to make yields so if you’ve got if you’ve got a bull run  bag already or you want to buy some assets so you can see appreciation you can 2x and 3x 4x 5x  your buy and hold position so your bull run bag there we go so as you can see i’m earning no yield  on it but i can take a loan against this and so i could borrow an asset then i could go use it now
 this if bitcoin doubles won’t be worth ten thousand dollars it’ll be worth twenty thousand  dollars and i’ll be creating yields from the borrows that i took against bitcoin and now i’m  getting the best of both worlds and you can just make your money go further for you.  Again, that’s a probably 20, 30 minute lesson at minimum.
 Plus there’s smart contract stuff we have to talk about.  And there’s LTV, loan to value ratios,  and making sure that you’re not getting over leveraged  and getting liquidated.  So again, don’t go degen on that,  but it’s an absolutely legit strategy.  And a lot of our clients and members are using it.  Again, head on to the educational portal in the UIG and commit to the stuff.
 Learn about the blockchain basics, et cetera, et cetera.  But once you get into the DeFi bootcamp, go through the DeFi bootcamp because we go deep  here and then go into chapter seven here, lending and borrowing.  And like it’s all in there lending  borrowing how to mitigate risk understanding different strategies and actually executing  on those strategies plus inside the defy framework section here highly recommend you check all of  these out but most of all i mean check all these out but most of all check out the liquidity pool
 entry criteria portfolio allocations so actually allocations on your  portfolio depending on your risk tolerances and just kind of what kind of investor you are  liquidity pool assessment and exit criteria knowing when to enter and exit these liquidity  pools again most people are just entering liquidity pools and being like oh yay like i’m  making some money and the next day their portfolio is down 20 they’re like what happened it’s like  it’s not that easy.
 There’s a strategy to it.  But most of all, check out the crypto business flow chart.  Colin leads a really powerful training on the flow chart,  really designing your business and understanding what you want it to do for you.  And the feedback from clients and members  and like what they’ve been working on is just unreal.
 They’re like, this is the part that I was missing.  So definitely do check that out.  With that said, I really hope this video was helpful to you in some way, shape or form. If  you liked it, like this video, subscribe to this channel, leave a comment, what landed by leaving  a comment and letting people know what landed, or maybe a lesson you pulled from it.
 You communicate  it in a different way than I did. And it might land for someone because you said it in a way that resonated with them. So do me a favor, like comment,  subscribe to this channel, tell your friends about it. This channel does not grow without  your support. And that is the cost of admission for this YouTube channel.
 If you ever received  value, share this in a few groups or share it with a few people, let’s get to a hundred K  subscribers. That’s like my goal for YouTube because that spreads the awareness and spreads the  word of crypto DeFi. We want to reach as many people and ensure that they don’t miss out on a  massive financial system paradigm shift.
 Times are changing and a lot of people are going to be left  in the dust. And we want this YouTube channel to reach hundreds of thousands of people so they can  get on board or at least be educated and aware of what’s going on in DeFi. And believe me, the more people that know about it, the better it is for all of us.  So share the word. With that said, I’m out of here. Peace.