Portals.Fi DeFi Weekly - October 24, 2025

Market Pulse

This week's market dynamics reveal a strong recovery from last week's correction, with encouraging signs across all major metrics.

• Total Market Cap: $3.84 Trillion (+1.24% in 24h, +5.5% WoW)
• Trading Volume (24h): $156 Billion
• BTC Dominance: 57.81% (stable from 57.67% last week)
• Gas (ETH): ~0.104 Gwei (dramatically down from ~3 Gwei last week)
• Sentiment: Fear & Greed Index: 30 (Fear) - improving from 22 (Extreme Fear)

 Executive Summary

This week marked a significant recovery phase following the sharp correction we witnessed in mid-October. The crypto market has demonstrated remarkable resilience, with total market cap climbing from $3.64T to $3.84T, representing a healthy 5.5% weekly recovery. More importantly, DeFi Total Value Locked (TVL) has rebounded to $152.5 billion, up 2.8% from last week's lows of $148.4 billion.

The recovery narrative is further supported by dramatically improved network conditions, with Ethereum gas prices plummeting to just 0.104 Gwei - creating an exceptionally favorable environment for DeFi operations. While sentiment remains cautious with the Fear & Greed Index at 30, the improvement from last week's "Extreme Fear" reading of 22 suggests growing confidence among market participants.

The Yield Market Pulse: Recovery Momentum

The DeFi yield landscape is experiencing a renaissance as market conditions stabilize and gas costs reach multi-month lows. Stablecoin yields remain elevated from the recent volatility, while liquid staking protocols are seeing renewed inflows as investors seek safer yield-generating strategies during the recovery phase.

The chart above illustrates the clear recovery trajectory in DeFi TVL, with the protocol ecosystem demonstrating remarkable resilience. The $4.1 billion recovery from correction lows signals strong underlying fundamentals and renewed confidence in decentralized finance infrastructure.

Top Opportunities This Week

The current market environment presents exceptional opportunities for yield farming, with improved conditions across multiple asset classes and strategies.

Spotlight: Plasma Ecosystem - The newly launched Plasma L1, backed by Bitfinex, Bybit, and Framework Ventures, is offering attractive incentive programs for early adopters. With 20% of XPL token supply dedicated to DeFi incentives, this represents a compelling opportunity for yield farmers willing to explore new ecosystems.

Protocol Spotlight: The Recovery Leaders

Several protocols have emerged as clear winners during this recovery phase, demonstrating both resilience and growth potential.

Liquid Staking Dominance: Lido continues to lead the recovery with a remarkable 7.80% weekly gain in TVL, reaching $34.2 billion. The protocol's dominance in liquid staking has proven particularly attractive as investors seek yield without sacrificing liquidity during volatile periods.

Restaking Renaissance: EigenLayer maintains its position as the third-largest DeFi protocol with $16.6 billion in TVL, posting a solid 4.72% weekly gain. The restaking narrative continues to attract institutional capital seeking enhanced yields on their ETH holdings.

Emerging Opportunities: ether.fi has shown impressive 6.61% weekly growth, highlighting the continued demand for liquid restaking tokens (LRTs) as a yield enhancement strategy.

Chain Performance Highlights:

Ethereum continues to dominate with over 60% of total DeFi TVL, benefiting significantly from the dramatic reduction in gas costs. The improved transaction economics are driving increased activity across all protocol categories.

Layer 2 Solutions are experiencing renewed growth as users take advantage of lower costs to explore yield opportunities. Arbitrum and Polygon are seeing increased stablecoin activity and cross-chain arbitrage opportunities.

Alternative L1s like Solana and BSC are maintaining steady growth, with several protocols posting double-digit weekly gains as capital rotates into higher-risk, higher-reward opportunities.

Portals.fi Platform Updates

• Cross-Chain swaps COMING SOON!
• New PortalsFi Community channel is LIVE on Telegram.
• New Protocol Integrations: This week, we've added support for several emerging protocols, including Plasma ecosystem opportunities and new liquid restaking providers, giving our users early access to the next generation of DeFi yield strategies.
• Upshift , cSigma Finance Inc , Term Finance featured on The DeFi Drop Podcast by PortalsFi. More to come next week. Watch the full segment here.

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Looking Ahead: Riding the Recovery Wave

Market Outlook: The current recovery appears to be driven by improved fundamentals rather than speculative momentum. DeFi TVL growth outpacing token price recovery suggests genuine adoption and utility growth, creating a solid foundation for sustained yield opportunities.

Key Catalysts to Watch:

• Ethereum gas prices: Continued low fees could accelerate DeFi adoption and complex strategy execution
• Institutional flows: Growing institutional interest in liquid staking and restaking protocols
• Cross-chain activity: Increased bridge volume could signal capital rotation into emerging ecosystems

Strategic Positioning:

• Dollar-cost averaging into established protocols during the recovery phase offers attractive risk-adjusted returns
• Gas-efficient strategies become increasingly viable with current network conditions
• New ecosystem exploration presents opportunities for early-mover advantages in emerging L1s and L2s

The Week Ahead: Momentum Building

As we move into the final week of October, several factors suggest continued recovery momentum. Bitcoin's stability above key support levels, combined with improving DeFi fundamentals and exceptionally favorable gas conditions, creates an environment ripe for yield farming opportunities.

The transition from "Extreme Fear" to "Fear" in market sentiment, while still cautious, indicates growing confidence among market participants. Historical patterns suggest that such sentiment improvements often precede sustained rallies in both token prices and protocol adoption.

For yield farmers, this represents an optimal entry point into high-quality strategies at attractive valuations, with the added benefit of minimal transaction costs for position management and rebalancing.

About Portals.fi: Portals.fi is the DeFi Super App. A one-click gateway to the entire on-chain economy. Powered by real-time data and seamless execution, Portals.fi connects traders to over 20 million assets, thousands of protocols, and every major blockchain.

Disclaimer: The content of this newsletter is for informational purposes only. It is not investment advice. Please do your own research and consult with a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions. DeFi investments carry significant risks, and past performance does not guarantee future results. More details here.