Ink’s DeFi ecosystem has reached about $211 million in total value locked, with lending protocol Tydro and perpetuals exchange Nado accounting for most of the activity, according to DefiLlama data as of Sept. 22, 2026. The figures place Ink, Kraken’s OP Stack-based Ethereum Layer 2, among the smaller networks by deposits but reveal an unusually derivatives-heavy market: Nado processed $8.67 billion in perpetuals volume over the preceding 30 days.
Tydro held about $141 million, or roughly two-thirds of Ink’s reported DeFi TVL, after deposits climbed 124% in 30 days. Nado accounted for another $54.37 million and generated almost all of the network’s trading intensity, with daily perpetuals volume reaching roughly $498 million at the measurement point. Ink’s daily DEX volume, by comparison, was about $2.73 million.
That split gives Ink a distinct profile among Ethereum rollups. Lending deposits and leveraged trading are carrying the network’s DeFi activity, while conventional spot trading and token-launch platforms remain comparatively small. Ink’s stablecoin market value stood near $173 million, providing much of the collateral base used across lending and derivatives applications.
Tydro’s growth puts lending at the center of Ink
Tydro is Ink’s largest money market and uses an architecture modeled on Aave V3. It recorded approximately $193,100 in fees and $20,900 in protocol revenue during the previous 30 days, according to DefiLlama.
Its rapid deposit increase coincides with the second season of its Ink Points program, which began Sept. 9. The program awards points for depositing and borrowing, with additional weighting based on factors including early participation, prior borrowing activity and holdings of Kraken’s wrapped Bitcoin asset, kBTC. The maximum boost raises a user’s points weighting by 50% within the same rewards pool.
Points campaigns can attract capital that moves quickly between protocols, particularly when lending markets offer straightforward collateral strategies. Tydro’s scale nevertheless gives Ink a substantial lending base relative to its overall TVL, and creates liquidity for assets such as ETH, stablecoins and wrapped tokens that can also feed the network’s trading venues.
Kraken has been building those wrapped-asset links since disclosing plans in July 2025 to integrate the INK token and Ink protocol into its products. On Sept. 8, the company introduced kHYPE, a token backed one-for-one by HYPE held in custody. kHYPE launched first on Ink and is intended for use in lending, trading and yield applications.
Nado’s perpetuals market outpaces Ink’s spot activity
Nado combines spot markets, perpetual futures and a money market through a unified margin account. Trades are matched through an offchain sequencer, while settlement occurs on Ink, a structure designed to offer faster execution without moving final balances away from the chain.
The platform recorded $1.54 million in fees and about $876,900 in protocol revenue over 30 days. Open interest stood at $45.03 million, while liquidations totaled $14.95 million. Its $13.12 million in spot volume over the same period was a fraction of the perpetuals turnover.
Ink’s derivatives volumes now compare more favorably with much larger Layer 2 ecosystems than its deposit totals would suggest. Its approximately $498 million in daily perpetuals volume was above Base’s reported $330 million and equivalent to about 15% of Arbitrum’s. Ink’s total DeFi TVL, in contrast, was about 46% of OP Mainnet’s and remained far below Base and Arbitrum, which were roughly 28.5 times and 6.8 times larger, respectively.
The concentration also creates a narrower market structure. A large share of visible activity depends on Nado’s ability to retain traders, liquidity providers and collateral. Third-party products are emerging around the venue, including Nadobro, which supports text-command trading, copy trading and automated strategy execution, and Trade, which offers grid strategies, copy trading and wallet analytics.
Kraken has also said it plans to offer a Hyperliquid-based perpetuals market to U.S. users. The plan connects the company’s trading ambitions with Ink’s existing focus on onchain derivatives, though the supplied materials did not give a deployment date.
Veda vaults bring large crosschain balances to Ink
Yield platform Veda reported $1.929 billion in total TVL across 13 chains, with about $896 million attributed to Ink. That represented 46.5% of Veda’s total balances, although Veda’s accounting is based on crosschain strategy positions and is not directly comparable with chain-level DeFi TVL measures.
In January 2026, Veda and Kraken introduced DeFi Earn vault access across Ethereum and Ink through Kraken’s interface. Sentora designs strategies and manages risk for those vaults. Sentora said in July that four managed yield vaults had surpassed $600 million in balances and served more than 80,000 active deposit users.
The vault arrangement gives Kraken users a route into smart-contract yield strategies without requiring them to independently navigate bridging, protocol selection and transaction signing across multiple applications. It also means that a sizeable amount of capital associated with Ink can be allocated across networks rather than remaining exclusively within Ink-native markets.
Token launches remain small but active
Ink’s token-launch ecosystem is developing around Uniswap v4-style liquidity pools and hooks, code extensions that allow pools to apply custom functions. InkyLabs operates InkyPump, where tokens use bonding curves before their liquidity migrates to Uniswap v4 pools, and InkySwap, a decentralized exchange.
InkySwap held about $981,900 in TVL, up 64.9% over 30 days, and recorded 362 active addresses in the preceding 24 hours, according to DefiLlama. Several of its most actively traded smaller tokens had limited liquidity: ANITA’s main WETH pool held about $142,900, BEAST’s held around $106,400, and BERT’s held approximately $36,500.
Tsunami, another launch platform, moved tokens from its bonding curve into Calamari v4 pools after graduation. It recorded $3.86 million in cumulative trading volume since its September launch, although just $44,100 remained on its bonding curves and its 30-day protocol revenue was about $2,131. Calamari’s TVL was roughly $167,700.
Hookit and Otomate offer related launch infrastructure, while Sentry supports pool creation on Ink and Robinhood Chain with pairs involving WETH and tokenized stocks. Mavrk is developing infrastructure for tokenized equity issuance, including holder governance, treasury controls and eligibility checks, though it had not opened equity issuance at the time covered by the supplied data.
Tokenized credit and wallet distribution add another layer
Ink’s active real-world asset total was about $22.29 million under the report’s methodology. The largest component was ACRED, at $11.10 million. ACRED is a tokenized credit fund developed by Securitize with Apollo, providing eligible participants onchain access to the Apollo Diversified Credit Fund.
Access to Ink is closely tied to Kraken Wallet, which natively supports the network alongside Ethereum, Solana, Base and other chains. Users can also bridge through providers listed on Ink’s bridge page, including Across, Bungee, Superbridge and Brid.gg, or withdraw supported assets directly to Ink and pay network fees in ETH.
Ink launched on Dec. 18, 2024, using the OP Stack and ETH for gas. Less than two years later, its current metrics show a network where lending incentives, exchange-linked wrapped assets and perpetuals infrastructure have developed faster than spot liquidity. Whether those flows become more durable will depend on whether the network can spread activity beyond its two dominant protocols without diluting the liquidity that has made its derivatives market unusually active for its size.
Want deeper context on derivatives and DeFi growth? Explore our guide on crypto derivatives and refine your Ink trading strategy.
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