Decentralized crypto lending platform Compound has resumed withdrawals from two out of three of its stablecoin markets where withdrawals had been paused since yesterday. Withdrawals were temporarily paused after risk manager Gauntlet<\/a> flagged a liquidity crunch tied to institutional liquidity firm Elixir\u2019s deUSD ecosystem.<\/p>\n To prevent potential bad debt, Gauntlet had recommended that Compound institute a temporary emergency pause on withdrawals from the three markets where deUSD and sdeUSD are accepted as collateral, namely USDC, USDS, and USDT on Ethereum mainnet.<\/p>\n In a fresh comment on the recommendations<\/a> from Gauntlet originally posted on Nov. 4, Gauntlet said<\/a> that Ethereum USDC and USDS market withdrawals were unpaused, \u201callowing users to resume normal activity.\u201d As for USDT, the comment suggests that users transfer more USDT into the affected market in order to \u201cfully cover any temporary reserve gap and provide an additional safety buffer.\u201d<\/p>\n The pause was proposed as a precaution while voting continued on Gauntlet’s separate risk parameter governance proposal<\/a>, which passed the evening of Nov. 4, and was executed on-chain around 6 p.m. UTC today.<\/p>\n In its original recommendation post, Gauntlet explained the reason for the pause, saying that Elixir\u2019s synthetic dollar asset deUSD and its staked counterpart sdeUSD were facing a liquidity crunch, with sdeUSD falling to $0.86 while the protocol\u2019s oracle was still showing the price at $1.06. Per Gauntlet, the price discrepancy is \u201cconsidered a vulnerability\u201d as it could let borrowers take on more than the market could actually back.<\/p>\n Compound implemented<\/a> the halt, blocking new borrows and withdrawals while still allowing users to add liquidity, repay loans, or post new collateral.<\/p>\n Compound currently has $2.26 billion locked across its on-chain lending markets, per data from DefiLlama<\/a>, making it the seventh-largest lending protocol in DeFi<\/p>\n Meanwhile, around 3 p.m. UTC today, deUSD dropped sharply from around $1 to $0.50, before quickly falling further over the past few hours to approach zero. <\/p>\n Elixir\u2019s website describes deUSD as \u201c\u200bthe rails for institutional assets to natively enter DeFi,\u201d saying the token is used exclusively by Securitize, and the \u201cgateway for asset holders\u201d in BlackRock, Hamilton Lane and Apollo funds.<\/p>\n At press time, the price of deUSD is around $0.028, as it fails to regain its dollar price-peg. <\/p>\n The underlying shock traces back to Stream Finance, the yield optimization protocol that collapsed<\/a> on Nov. 4, as its own synthetic dollar token, xUSD, collapsed to about $0.17. <\/p>\n As part of a recursive minting <\/a>agreement with Stream, Elixir reportedly had loaned<\/a> roughly $68 million to the platform, while accepting xUSD as collateral. In an X post on Nov. 3, before Stream\u2019s full collapse but with concerns already circulating, Elixir said<\/a> it had \u201cfull redemption rights at $1 with Stream for its lending position.\u201d<\/p>\n When Stream disclosed more than $90 million in losses<\/a>, deUSD and sdeUSD took a hit, triggering cascading stress beyond Compound, and, as of just a few hours ago, resulting in deUSD\u2019s full-blown collapse. <\/p>\n Meanwhile, the price of Compound’s COMP started falling on Nov. 3, as broader markets slumped, but is flat over the past 24 hours. <\/p>\n The turmoil also rippled into fastUSD, a synthetic dollar-pegged token backed by deUSD and used across multiple protocols, including Yei Finance, currently the second-largest protocol on the Sei network by TVL.<\/p>\n In a Nov. 5 post on X<\/a>, Yei Finance said it temporarily paused its protocol, pointing to \u201cthe ongoing fastUSD market situation.\u201d The team later said<\/a> it would repay about $8.6 million in USDC borrowed against staked fastUSD and confirmed that \u201call user funds on Yei remain fully solvent and will be 100% withdrawable.\u201d<\/p>\nThe Pause<\/h2>\n
Elixir deUSD Depegs<\/h2>\n
![\"the-defiant\"](\"https:\/\/thedefiant.io\/_next\/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.thedefiant.io%2Fpasted-1762464520193-png-876db3d6-0e73-4d04-913c-d391f5a1b1b4.png&w=3840&q=100\"\/)
It\u2019s All Connected to Stream<\/h2>\n
Ripple Effect<\/h2>\n