Author: Stephen, Crypto KOL
Compiled by: Felix, PANews
Currently, sustainable and scalable ETH yields above 20% are not common; crypto KOL Stephen reviews strategies that keep the annualized percentage rate (APR) above 20%.
wstETH
wstETH can be said to be the most popular, competitive, and scalable strategy ever. Even in the deepest bear markets, the APR typically ranges from 8% to 30%.
The way wstETH works is by utilizing the staking yield of ETH (approximately 3%) to offset the cost of borrowing ETH (approximately 2%).
There are four excellent places to operate:
Morpho Labs
Aave
Compound Growth
Euler Labs
Currently, the APR of this strategy is about 26% to 46%. Of course, you can use Contango to automatically leverage these positions to generate TANGO points, OP emissions, etc.
Leverage weETH
This strategy is the same as the previous one, but this strategy is also eligible for various points and emissions. Therefore, the average yield of this strategy is slightly higher:
ether.fi points
Veda points
LRT2 points
EigenLayer programmatic rewards (such as $LRT2)
The three blue-chip money markets are the best places for leverage:
Compound Growth
Aave
Morpho Labs
Before considering LRTsquared, EtherFi S4, and Veda points, the APR ranges from 22% to 36%. The actual yield after considering points may be above 50%.
Note: Although Morpho's APR is currently ranked first, the gap between the top three protocols is not large, so hedging between them can often yield the most competitive and consistently high APR (while hedging against unstable borrowing rates).
AERO mining
Compound Growth is currently paying users to borrow AERO using cbETH, ETH, and wstETH as collateral.
At the same time, you can earn about 200% APR on AERO through voting on Aerodrome.
Of course, the loan-to-value ratio (LLTV) is 65%, so let's look at some reasonable positions:
Loan-to-value ratio (LTV) 50%
Relative AERO liquidation increase: 30%
Total ETH collateral yield: 100% APR
Loan-to-value ratio 25%
Relative AERO liquidation increase: 160%
Total ETH collateral yield: 54% APR
ynETH
Spectra is a competitor to Pendle, and although it has recently generated some buzz with its USR pool, its launch of the ynETH pool also offers some market opportunities.
With 0 boost, the APR is 33%, and with boost, the APR can reach 100%.
Notably, if Spectra becomes a true competitor, holding/locking SPECTRA could yield good results, so increasing some risk exposure to enhance returns might not be a bad idea.
gmETH
This strategy is somewhat controversial because gmETH has experienced principal losses.
gmETH is known as the 'Counter Party Vault', and when traders on GMX achieve excess profits, it tends to drop relative to ETH. The opposite is also true, as is the norm.
You can implement this strategy on Dolomite, where the current annual interest rate is about 30%, and the historical average annual interest rate is about 20%.
GMWETH (Umami)
This strategy is very similar to the previous position, but it hedges most of the delta and risk.
Although the current APR is about 16.5%, it has historically been quite high (around 50%), and in the medium-term future, the average APR will exceed 20%.
pufETH
Despite increased competition recently, pufETH has long been a gold mine. The historical APR of this LP (30bps fee tier) has ranged from 15% to 50%, with very low rebalancing.
It's like a hidden gem, although it won't last forever.
Sustainable and scalable ETH yields above 20% are not common.
You can find some smaller but still incredible opportunities at places like D2LFinance, but when it comes to smaller positions for smaller yields, making them too public is self-deception.
Further reading: Overview of the seven major DeFi staking platforms for 2025: How to maximize returns?
