ApeSwap, the automated market maker (AMM), yield farming, and staking platform on BINANCE Smart Chain has been having a moment this week as metrics for the application and token price surged.
In the last 7-days the decentralized finance dapp, which is actually a fork of PancakeSwap has seen transaction volume increase more than 350% up to $213 million. The number of unique active wallets interacting with the dapps smart contracts has shot right up to over 21,000 or a 106% increase while the number of transactions has swelled over 141% to almost 163,000. Interestingly, the average transaction on ApeSwap is around $1300.
At the same time, the token price of its native token BANANA has been on an impressive run increasing over 500% in the last 7-days from around $1 to almost $6 at the time of writing.
When comparing to PancakeSwap, the most popular exchange on Binance Smart Chain currently we see a big gulf in the metrics. One observer on Twitter even calling ApeSwap ‘Pepsi’ while PancakeSwap is ‘Coke’. The clear difference in the two projects’ token price and market capitalization is clear but it’s also obvious that customers are quite fickle and hunting for the best annual percentage yields (APY) on their crypto stacks. One stimulating factor for ApeSwap could be the 165% APY they are currently offering when staking BANANA on the platform while PancakeSwap offers 95% for a very similar service.
Using the example of a $1300 transaction per user as a guide. Investment into the BANANA staking would yield the depositor around $2145 per annum or around $180 per month. Not a bad little kickback for doing pretty much nothing.
There has been a notable rush to alternative DeFi solutions such as those on BSC and Polygon. These DeFi tools can offer the same services as their Ethereum counterparts at a fraction of the cost and in many cases much quicker. Binance Smart Chain built out its DeFi ecosystem almost immediately from launch and is now benefitting from the current bull run and from thirsty investors.
Many of these investors are coming from traditional share trading backgrounds and expect low fees and lightning-fast transactions. Something Ethereum has struggled with as congestion clogs the network and keeps gas fees high. Dapps such as ApeSwap are offering users what they want right now and reaping the rewards.
Useful Links
- What is ApeSwap
- BSC Q1 Report
- Setup METAMASK on L2
Newsletter 
