Blast TVL exceeds US$2.1 billion and will launch mainnet on February 29

Author: Tom Mitchelhill, CoinTelegraph; Compiler: Deng Tong, Golden Finance

Just a few days before its newly announced mainnet launch (February 29), the Ethereum Layer 2 network Blast The total value locked (TVL) has exceeded US$2.1 billion.

Blast’s TVL currently stands at $2.1 billion, an increase of more than 2,200% from when its bridge protocol first went live on November 22, according to DefiLlama.

Blast's TVL has exceeded $2.1 billion. Source: DefiLlama

The vast majority of locked value comes from hopeful airdrop hunters who lock their Ethereum into the protocol to obtain future airdrops of Blast tokens, the protocol team said , the airdrop will take place sometime in May.

The launch of the Blast protocol was not without controversy, as once funds were locked in the platform, users were unable to withdraw funds until its mainnet launched.

In November, Dan Robinson, head of research at crypto venture capital firm Paradigm, said the launch of Blast “has crossover in both messaging and execution” as a delayed rollout could set the stage for the future. The developers set a bad precedent.

The Blast protocol once again stirred up controversy on February 26, when a gambling protocol called "Risk on Blast" allegedly performed a Rug Pull. The GambleFi project has raised 420 Ethereum (ETH) (worth $1.35 million at current prices) for a pre-sale of tokens called RISK, which began on February 22 and ended the next day.

The team has since moved funds for algorithmic stablecoin Dai (DAI) to non-custodial cryptocurrency exchange ChangeNOW and deleted associated social media accounts.

Launched in mid-November, the Blast Protocol is a scaling solution for the Ethereum network that provides native yields on Ethereum (ETH) and stablecoins to users who put their money into the protocol.

It is worth noting that Blast’s founder Tieshun Roquerre (pseudonym “PacMan”) is also the founder of the NFT platform Blur.

In a Nov. 23 X post, Roquerre defended Blast against criticism that yields are “too good to be true,” claiming that Blast yields are generated by Lido and MakerDAO.

Blast closed a $20 million seed round led by Paradigm and Standard Crypto just days before launch.