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- Chainlink has recently launched its DeFi Yield Index to showcase real-time lending rates in DeFi, marking the start of multiple index offerings to establish itself as a major provider in cryptocurrency.
- Decentralized Finance lending has grown to $47B in total value locked across hundreds of protocols as of January 2025.
Chainlink, a leading provider of decentralized oracle networks, is making strides toward becoming the go-to benchmark index provider for the cryptocurrency market. Through its Chainlink DeFi Yield Index (CDY Index), the platform seeks to enhance transparency, efficiency, and accessibility within decentralized finance (DeFi). To date, Chainlink’s oracle network has played a pivotal role in the sector, facilitating over $9 trillion in transaction value, according to the company.
According to Chainlink’s blog, traditional finance has long relied on well-established indexes to monitor macroeconomic trends, but DeFi still lacks a similar system. In traditional markets, the federal funds rate acts as a benchmark, influencing all other rates. However, DeFi does not have a single base rate that impacts the entire ecosystem.
With its proven reliability and accuracy, Chainlink is uniquely positioned to bridge this gap. Its decentralized data aggregation methodologies provide a trustworthy and resilient foundation for constructing a comprehensive DeFi lending yield index, making it a natural contender for setting industry-wide benchmarks.
How the CDY Index Works
The Chainlink DeFi Yield Index is designed to ensure accuracy and market relevance while improving capital efficiency and liquidity in on-chain lending. It helps market participants discover yield opportunities, evaluate risks, and optimize capital allocation. The CDY Index follows a structured approach, with Chainlink serving as the Index Administrator and Space and Time acting as the Calculation Agent, ensuring fairness and transparency.
As we previously stated, the CDY Index benefits a range of participants in the DeFi ecosystem. Institutional investors can access new yield opportunities, enhancing risk management, capital deployment, and investment product development. DeFi protocols gain a reliable benchmark that improves market transparency and enables innovative investment solutions for both DeFi and stablecoin users. Meanwhile, DeFi lending users benefit from increased liquidity and reduced slippage, making borrowing and exiting positions more efficient. This deeper liquidity also attracts more borrowers, potentially boosting protocol revenues and yielding opportunities for liquidity providers.
To ensure precise tracking and reliable benchmarking, the Chainlink DeFi Yield Index is initially designed to focus on the most liquid crypto assets, which include USDC, USDT, Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC), and Wrapped Ethereum (WETH). By prioritizing these widely used digital assets, the index enhances market transparency, liquidity, and efficiency,
Chirag Dhull, Head of Developer Platform Growth at Chainlink Labs, emphasized Chainlink’s unique position as the leading provider of DeFi benchmarks, stating:
Because it has long been the backbone of DeFi, Chainlink is uniquely positioned to be this index provider. By launching the CDY Index, Chainlink continues to solidify its role as the standard for on-chain finance.
Driven by its advancements in the DeFi space, Chainlink has witnessed a 9% increase in price over the last 24 hours, now trading at $20.75. However, it’s important to note that Chainlink faced a notable decline of 13% in the past week.
