Lending turned into the biggest source of value for TRON (TRX) in the past year
TRON is growing its lending sector with JustLend. The protocol holds up to $8.3B in value based on the method of reporting, and represents a large share of TRON's total value.
Lending was one of the growth apps for TRON (TRX), boosting the chain’s locked value. JustLend was one of the busiest smart contracts, drawing in 55% of all value locked on the TRON network.
TRON (TRX) increased its lending exposure in 2024, following the expansion of DeFi on all chains. JustLend was one of the growing apps for the past 12 months, ending up with 55% of the total value locked on the chain.
TRON locks in a total of $7.36B in its decentralized protocols, including lending and DEX. The chain still hosts more than $60B in stablecoins, which also partially flow into lending.
Based on DeFi Llama data, JustLend holds $5.89B in value locked. CryptoQuant reports $6.17B in lending protocols and a higher total TVL for TRON, due to a different methodology in accounting for apps.
JustLend’s own reporting accounts for $8.3B in total value locked. The protocol offers varied annualized earnings for all locked assets. JustLend reports more than 469K active wallets, although user counts may be lower.
While JustLend reports significant value locked, DappRadar only registers 94 daily active wallets, a small fraction of the total reported users. JustLend is the seventh most-visited app on TRON, with $3.25M in daily volumes.
TRON’s lending app managed to perform well based on existing metrics, competing with DeFi versions from the Ethereum ecosystem. The liquidity on TRON is still separate from all other chains. Lending may find another boost in 2025, as the chain will carry its own version of WBTC, potentially serving as valuable collateral.
JustLend inflows increased in Q4
With those results, JustLend is building up its share of TVL compared to Aave (AAVE), which already holds more than $20B spread into loans and collaterals. Lending on TRON surpassed bridge deposits and centralized trading activity, rising in the past two months of the year.
JustLend offers a similar model to other lending protocols, where traders can use their assets as collateral, instead of outright selling. To avoid volatility and liquidations, JustLend DAO is itself a liquidity provider. Demand for JustLend also increased as a tool for passive income.
JustLend has its own collection of wrapped tokens, including a version of jUSDT. However, the token is not denominated in dollars but carries a price of $0.01. The asset has just 2,776 holders, similar to other tokens with a few thousand depositors.
JustLend also has large-scale whales staking TRX or other assets, helping the app build up its value. More than 10K wallets hold jTRX, the locked token for the lending protocol.
TRON marked a year of price records
It took years for TRX to break its record from 2017, achieved soon after its ICO. TRX started the year at around $0.10, peaking at $0.40 in early December. As the year comes to a close, TRX corrected toward $0.26, still posting significant net gains.
TRX trading slowed down, with open interest sinking to $166M from a peak close to $350M. The network aims to regain its major use cases and reputation, by turning TRX into a deflationary asset. The chain destroys 1.5% of the TRX supply in a year, adding to the token’s growth trend this year.
TRON broke above $2B in fees generated for the year to date. Despite catching up with Ethereum, TRON is still in second place based on total earnings. Ethereum is still ahead with $2.45B in the year to date, based on TokenTerminal data.
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