Cardano, Solana TVLs hold up despite SEC security label

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) classified several tokens as securities in its recent lawsuits against leading crypto exchange platforms Binance and Coinbase. Tokens such as Cardano and Solana are in the list but their Total Value Locked (TVL) on decentralized finance applications hasn’t observed a downturn, a sign of resilience despite falling prices.

Also read: Two key dates over the SEC request to freeze Binance assets

Why DeFi TVL matters 

TVL is a metric used to measure the total value of all assets locked or staked in a DeFi protocol or platform. The higher a protocol’s TVL, the more trustworthy it is considered in the DeFi community. Moreover, an elevated TVL is indicative of higher utility and  adoption among users. 

The TVL of Cardano, Solana and BNB Chain networks declined around 1% on a monthly basis despite the recent classification of these tokens as securities by the US financial regulator, according to data from DeFiLlama.

Of all the tokens that were marked as securities in the US financial regulator’s lawsuit against Binance and Coinbase, these three saw no significant impact on their TVL. 

Kyle Doane, trader at crypto investment firm Arca, told Coindesk in an email that the current crypto winter is a prolonged one, so the current market participants in the DeFi ecosystem are unfazed by the latest actions from the SEC. 

The tokens themselves being deemed securities have nothing to do with the viability of the underlying tech of DeFi and does not make the tokens/dApps any more or less valuable.

 Doane said. 

Cardano and Solana TVL remains largely unaffected on monthly basis

Cardano network’s TVL declined 6.41% overnight, but there is no negative impact on the total value of digital assets locked in the protocol. Based on the below chart from DeFiLlama, the protocol’s TVL (without staking and vesting) at the time of writing is $147.9 million, as of May 8 it was $163.39 million. This marks an increase of 10.49% on a monthly basis.

On June 5, before the SEC announced its lawsuits against Binance and Coinbase, the TVL stood at $183.06 million.

Cardano TVL without including staking and vesting

For Solana, TVL declined to $557.59 million on June 8 from $568.33 million a month earlier, or 1.9%. Despite the SEC’s label for Cardano and Solana, their TVL suggests that these assets remain resilient signaling a potential price recovery in the short term.