The first week of June saw DeFi split in two. Whale flows, total value locked, and sharp price moves point to three DeFi tokens and their respective projects to watch, with one running hot and two bleeding.
This time, the smart money signal and price action are largely in line.
Hyperfluid ($HYPE)
Hyperliquid is the clear winner of the week. $HYPE is up about 17% in seven days and about 51% in the past month, even after falling 8% in the past 24 hours.
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The whale currents explain the force. New wallets added $24.4 million, 3.4 times their normal pace, and about $2.5 million in $HYPE left-wing exchanges. Coins leaving the exchanges usually indicate that holders are settling rather than preparing to sell.
The fundamentals are similar. Hyperliquid total value locked (TVL), the dollar value of assets deposited in a protocol, rose from about $5.52 billion at the end of May to about $5.88 billion today.
Whales made about $2.7 million, and Arthur Hayes was one of the sellers. With TVL still rising, this indicates profit taking within a strong run rather than a top.
Airport ($AERO)
Aerodrome, the largest decentralized exchange on Base, is the mirror image. $AEROthe DeFi token, fell 6.85% on the day and around 22% in the past month.
The whale currents are mixed rather than clean. New portfolios added about $17.3 million, but that was below their usual pace, while the biggest gainers trimmed about $222,000. The bigger sign is that deposits are piling up, which often indicates that selling pressure is ahead.
The trend is also visible in the fundamental figures. Aerodrome TVL has fallen from about $501 million in January to about $312 million now.
Annual incentives of nearly $165 million also exceed revenues of about $52 million, so the protocol pays out more than it earns.
Jupiter ($YUP)
Jupiter is the most interesting case, because the project and one of its core tokens are pulling in different directions. $YUPthe governance token, fell about 15% in 24 hours. Yet the protocol itself is growing. TVL rose to $2.51 billion from about $2.34 billion in April, excluding stimulus spending.
Sales are concentrated in $JLPa separate DeFi token representing a portion of the Jupiter Perps liquidity pool. $JLP holders deposit a basket of assets and act as a house against perpetual traders.
They earn the majority of the perpetrator’s fees but absorb the pool’s market risk. Whales have left $JLP at 14.7 times their normal pace, sending part of $24.9 million to the exchanges.
Here is the link between the two. $JLP And $YUP are both Jupiter tokens, but they do different tasks. $JLP finances the perpetrator exchange, and $YUP lives off the fees generated by the fair. So money on the run $JLP and the $YUP price are linked to the source.
When whales take out $24.9 million $JLPthey are withdrawing from Jupiter’s largest compensation engine.
Fewer backers means a weaker engine, and a weaker engine means lower costs $YUP. So the $JLP exit and the 15% $YUP place the point in the same way. It’s one story about Jupiter, not two.
The compensation and TVL figures still look healthy for the time being. But if the $JLP exit remains so hot, the costs behind it $YUP will weaken in the next place.