Layer 1 blockchain Canto sees surge in trading activity

Cosmos-based Layer 1 blockchain Canto's total value locked (TVL) doubled in January, reflecting a breakthrough for the emerging blockchain. 

On Canto, TVL — or the dollar amount of assets staked on the network — has risen to $137 million from $66 million on Jan. 1, according to DeFiLlama data. This 107% TVL surge came after an investment from Variant Fund, a VC firm, earlier this month.

With a growing TVL, Canto is now the fourth most-valuable Layer 1 blockchain in the Cosmos ecosystem, lagging behind Cronos, Kava and Osmosis.

Canto has been attracting attention for its focus on incentivizing the development of DeFi apps, which operate without taking fees from users and rely on Canto incentives. The network provides subsidies to incentivize liquidity providers and lenders who support its decentralized exchanges and lending market.

Activity surge

The network's native decentralized exchange, Canto DEX, has seen a significant rise in daily trading volume in January, reaching $52 million, from less than $2 million at the start of this month, CoinGecko data shows. 

Additionally, the amount of assets sent to Canto from bridges with Ethereum has increased by over $74 million in January, according to on-chain data provided on Dune. Meanwhile, the price of Canto's native token has risen by several times during January. It currently trades at $0.4, up 500% from $0.08 during the month.

Although Canto's approach to funding developers and public-good DeFi protocols has attracted interest from the crypto community and investors, the long-term sustainability of the network's model is unclear due to its high inflation rate, as noted by researcher Kevin Peng from The Block. The circulating supply of Canto has increased by 158% since September, from approximately 164 million to approximately 424 million.