Ethereum layer-2 Blast launched its mainnet on February 29 at 21:00 UTC unlocking nearly $2.3 billion in staked crypto previously locked on the network, with approximately $280 million making an initial exit.
The optimistic rollup blockchain scaler gives users up to 5% annual percentage yield on Ether (ETH) and stablecoins held on the network generated from staked ETH and United States Treasury Bills (T-Bills) managed by the blockchain protocol MakerDAO.
Crypto sent to the network was locked before the mainnet launch, so its 180,000 users had no way to withdraw the funds sent until now.
Blast's total value locked (TVL) reached $2.27 billion on Feb. 29, which has now fallen to under $2 billion after launch, according to DeFiLlama.
Blast's total value locked hit a high of nearly $2.3 billion, dropping to $1.99 billion after its mainnet launch. Source: DeFiLlama
The network had crossed the $2 billion TVL milestone for the first time a few days earlier on February 27.
Airdrop hunters have flocked to the blockchain, seeding it in hopes of taking a slice with the Blast token the team says is coming in May.
The launch of Blast also caused controversy.
Dan Robinson, head of research at seed investor Blast Paradigm wrote in a November other."
There are many components to Blast that I am interested in and interested in getting people involved in. Nonetheless, we at Paradigm think this week's announcement crossed a line in both messaging and execution. For example, we disagree with the decision to launchâŠ
