Ground COO: DeFi is Losing Its Way, Yield Wars Overlook Users' Real Needs

Odaily News, Ground COO Stephanie Vaughan stated that the current DeFi industry is陷入 a "yield war," but market participants are more focused on securing distribution access to fintech platforms, overlooking the real problems users need to solve.

She pointed out that Robinhood, Coinbase, Revolut, and Kraken are competing for user funds, while protocols such as Aave, Morpho, and Ethena are competing to become the infrastructure for lending strategies. Vault service providers and risk management institutions are also competing around fintech platforms. However, this model does not establish DeFi's own user relationships—it merely fights for the opportunity to be selected by platforms.

Stephanie believes that the current market is signaling that DeFi products have near-zero pricing power. Much of the yield comes from subsidies provided by platforms, Vault service providers, strategy providers, or underlying protocols, rather than genuine demand created by the products themselves. This is more like paying "shelf fees" than achieving true distribution capabilities.

She further noted that some multi-strategy Vaults suffer from issues such as idle capital, deployment delays, and slow governance processes, resulting in a gap between the actual returns users receive and the advertised APY. In contrast, traditional financial products like money market funds can put capital to work immediately.

Stephanie stated that with declining L2 costs and maturing cross-chain infrastructure, the chain itself is no longer a core competitive advantage. In the future, DeFi should build products closer to personal execution environments, driven by user needs. She believes the competitive focus should shift from shared Vaults to infrastructure like MPC wallets, allowing users to retain control over strategies while platforms handle execution and streamline processes.