IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedgfe/2023-44.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Interconnected DeFi: Ripple Effects from the Terra Collapse

Author

Abstract

The emerging world of decentralized finance (DeFi), facilitated by smart contracts operating on blockchain networks, has been notable both for its rapid growth and the high-profile collapses of several of its largest participants. In this paper, we provide a technical account of the financial mechanisms which facilitated the growth and eventual collapse of the Terra Network. From this analysis, we outline a generalizable economic theory of blockchains which aims to differentiate the economics of blockchains as programmable environments from blockchains as accounting ledgers for crypto-assets. This adds to the existing literature on crypto-assets, which largely focuses on the financial characteristics of the crypto-assets themselves rather than their underlying blockchains. We argue that DeFi is structured so as to offer consumers distinct blockchain networks as competing choices differentiated by several key characteristics. We test several implications of this theory using Terra's collapse as a natural experiment, finding evidence that bridges between programmable blockchain networks create increased risk of spillover effects to other blockchains' programmable environments in the wake of a major shock event like Terra's collapse. Specifically, blockchains suffered a time-bound loss of market share and the likelihood of this loss grew approximately 40% for each additional bridge that was deployed in common with Terra at the time of Terra's collapse.

Suggested Citation

  • Anton Badev & Cy Watsky, 2023. "Interconnected DeFi: Ripple Effects from the Terra Collapse," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2023-044, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2023-44
    DOI: 10.17016/FEDS.2023.044
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/feds/files/2023044pap.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.17016/FEDS.2023.044?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Igor Makarov & Antoinette Schoar, 2022. "Cryptocurrencies and Decentralized Finance (DeFi)," NBER Working Papers 30006, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Uhlig, Harald, 2022. "A Luna-tic Stablecoin Crash," CEPR Discussion Papers 17465, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. Corbet, Shaen & Goodell, John W. & Günay, Samet, 2022. "What drives DeFi prices? Investigating the effects of investor attention," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    4. Jiageng Liu & Igor Makarov & Antoinette Schoar, 2023. "Anatomy of a Run: The Terra Luna Crash," NBER Working Papers 31160, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Yousaf, Imran & Yarovaya, Larisa, 2022. "Static and dynamic connectedness between NFTs, Defi and other assets: Portfolio implication," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    6. Bouri, Elie & Saeed, Tareq & Vo, Xuan Vinh & Roubaud, David, 2021. "Quantile connectedness in the cryptocurrency market," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    7. Lyons, Richard K. & Viswanath-Natraj, Ganesh, 2023. "What keeps stablecoins stable?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    8. Francesca Carapella & Nathan Swem, 2022. "Decentralized Finance (DeFi): Transformative Potential & Associated Risks," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2022-057, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    9. Jacob D. Leshno & Philipp Strack, 2020. "Bitcoin: An Axiomatic Approach and an Impossibility Theorem," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 2(3), pages 269-286, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yousaf, Imran & Jareño, Francisco & Esparcia, Carlos, 2022. "Tail connectedness between lending/borrowing tokens and commercial bank stocks," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    2. Yousaf, Imran & Jareño, Francisco & Martínez-Serna, María-Isabel, 2023. "Extreme spillovers between insurance tokens and insurance stocks: Evidence from the quantile connectedness approach," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 39(C).
    3. Kirimhan, Destan, 2023. "Importance of anti-money laundering regulations among prosumers for a cybersecure decentralized finance," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    4. Bennett, Donyetta & Mekelburg, Erik & Williams, T.H., 2023. "BeFi meets DeFi: A behavioral finance approach to decentralized finance asset pricing," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    5. Walid Mensi & Mariya Gubareva & Hee-Un Ko & Xuan Vinh Vo & Sang Hoon Kang, 2023. "Tail spillover effects between cryptocurrencies and uncertainty in the gold, oil, and stock markets," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 9(1), pages 1-27, December.
    6. Jareño, Francisco & Yousaf, Imran, 2023. "Artificial intelligence-based tokens: Fresh evidence of connectedness with artificial intelligence-based equities," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    7. Yousaf, Imran & Yarovaya, Larisa, 2022. "The relationship between trading volume, volatility and returns of Non-Fungible Tokens: evidence from a quantile approach," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    8. Jean Barthélémy & Paul Gardin & Benoit Nguyen, 2023. "Stablecoins and the Financing of the Real Economy," Working papers 908, Banque de France.
    9. Qiao, Xingzhi & Zhu, Huiming & Tang, Yiding & Peng, Cheng, 2023. "Time-frequency extreme risk spillover network of cryptocurrency coins, DeFi tokens and NFTs," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 51(C).
    10. Yousaf, Imran & Riaz, Yasir & Goodell, John W., 2023. "Integration between asset management tokens, asset management stock, and other financial markets: Evidence from TVP-VAR modeling," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    11. Chu, Jeffrey & Chan, Stephen & Zhang, Yuanyuan, 2023. "An analysis of the return–volume relationship in decentralised finance (DeFi)," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 236-254.
    12. Umar, Zaghum & Usman, Muhammad & Choi, Sun-Yong & Rice, John, 2023. "Diversification benefits of NFTs for conventional asset investors: Evidence from CoVaR with higher moments and optimal hedge ratios," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    13. Ghosh, Indranil & Alfaro-Cortés, Esteban & Gámez, Matías & García-Rubio, Noelia, 2023. "Prediction and interpretation of daily NFT and DeFi prices dynamics: Inspection through ensemble machine learning & XAI," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    14. Shah, Anand & Bahri, Anu, 2023. "Tokenomics: How “Risky” are the Stablecoins?," MPRA Paper 119646, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Yousaf, Imran & Pham, Linh & Goodell, John W., 2023. "Interconnectedness between healthcare tokens and healthcare stocks: Evidence from a quantile VAR approach," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 271-283.
    16. Yousaf, Imran & Riaz, Yasir & Goodell, John W., 2023. "Energy cryptocurrencies: Assessing connectedness with other asset classes," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).
    17. Ali, Shoaib & Ijaz, Muhammad Shahzad & Yousaf, Imran, 2023. "Dynamic spillovers and portfolio risk management between defi and metals: Empirical evidence from the Covid-19," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    18. Lee, Seungju & Lee, Jaewook & Lee, Yunyoung, 2023. "Dissecting the Terra-LUNA crash: Evidence from the spillover effect and information flow," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    19. Yousaf, Imran & Abrar, Afsheen & Goodell, John W., 2023. "Connectedness between travel & tourism tokens, tourism equity, and other assets," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    20. Yousaf, Imran & Youssef, Manel & Goodell, John W., 2022. "Quantile connectedness between sentiment and financial markets: Evidence from the S&P 500 twitter sentiment index," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    DeFi; Cryptocurrencies; Stablecoins;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E42 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Monetary Sytsems; Standards; Regimes; Government and the Monetary System
    • G01 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Financial Crises
    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2023-44. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Ryan Wolfslayer ; Keisha Fournillier (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbgvus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.