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Each day there are new users who discovered and onboarded the Terra ecosystem. However, do we see gradual increase or spikes whenever there are new protocols launching on Terra? Let's find out.
Terra aims to be the blockchain for decentralized finance (DeFi) applications. Equipped with stablecoins that stood strong against the test of time, Terra truly is becoming the spawning pool of top DeFi Protocols. But, what's a growing blockchain without users? In this dashboard, we will be finding out if the growth of Terra's userbase is affected solely by the price of LUNA or the launch of new protocols.
The new user count in this graph is obtained by getting the min date of the addresses when it first has a non-zero balance. This balance includes all stablecoins on Terra and not just the balance LUNA because stablecoins are staples of the Terra ecosystem. Launch dates of the protocols are found out by getting their first smart contract interaction's block_timestamp.
The graph below shows the new user count VS the price of LUNA, the purpose of this graph is to show that new user inflow is not solely defined by the price action of LUNA. In this graph, we can see that although there are some correlation between the price and new user inflow, especially during its climb from sub $1 to $22, the price does not dictate the growth of the blockchain, i.e. the growth maintained at a steady 2-3k new user count per day even after the price dropped about 75%. Based on this, we can certainly say that there must be other factors that are driving in new users. Among various factors, the most obvious ones are the protocols that reside in the Terra ecosystem, where the users can generate a sizable passive income even in a bear market, given that Terra mostly operates using its stablecoins.
So how are protocol launches affecting the growth of Terra's userbase? The graph below shows the number of new users per day after the each of the protocol's launch. Note that multiple protocols launched between June 25 to June 27, namely Spectrum, Mirror V2, and Pylon Wave 1, they are counted as 1 event (1 color). Pylon's launch is counted as 2 separate events because the first event (their so-called Wave 1) is the the debut of their token, MINE, which is also a public sale, and the second event is the launch of their main function (aka Wave 2), where the users can lock their UST in exchange for rewards in the form of newly launched tokens.
Based on the graph below, Terra's growth seem to be maintained by the launch of new protocols, where the daily user growth increases back to the 2k+ per day range when it started to decrease, for example, Terraswap's launch on November 14, and Mirror V2, Spectrum, and Pylon Wave 1's launch on June 25 and June 26. However, the story doesn't end here, the real magic appears when we compare the launch of protocols with the inflow of USD, which is discussed next.
The graph below shows the total amount of USD onboarded to the Terra ecosystem for each protocol's launch. The amount of USD onboarded is calculated by getting the balance_usd of each of the users and group them according to the protocols' launches. Based on the graph below, we can see that there are a few spikes in the inflow of USD to Terra, where most of them are a day before the launch of a new protocol. Coincidence? I think not. The only explanation of this phenomenon is that users are onboarding to Terra with the intention of participating in the protocols' launches, which further proves that new protocols do affect the inflow of users, despite the fact that it's not obvious in the graph above.
Do note that Spectrum and Mirror V2's launches did not cause any spikes. The explanation for this is that Spectrum and Mirror V2's launches are eclipsed by Pylon, a highly anticipated protocol among the Terra community, such that users are saving up to participate in Pylon's launch instead of Spectrum and Mirror V2.
The total USD onboarded does not tell the whole story about the inflow of new users, we can also find out the overall wealth of the participants by comparing the average USD onboarded, as a high total USD onboarded may mean that a high number of user participated but in less amounts of USD. Based on the graph below, we can see that most of the protocol's launch have a similar average onboarded USD, which is from 15k to 20k USD per new user. This means that despite the varying total amount of USD onboarded before launch, the wealth of the users who participated do not differ much.
The graphs below show the logged versions of total onboarded USD and the average onboarded USD, for a better view of the situation. It is found out that the ecosystem maintained a healthy growth of about 1M onboarded USD per day since February despite the crash in May. This means that the implementation of stablecoins definitely helped in maintaining the growth of the userbase, as stablecoins are not affected by the crash and the ecosystem will be at its full potential whether it's a bear or a bull market.
The graph of the average onboarded USD shows a similar story, where the average continues to climb, showing confidence in the ecosystem by the general public (since new users are the general public before they became Terra users).
This section compares the address count, total onboarded USD, and the average onboarded USD for all the protocol launches. The USD amounts are derived from the balance_usd of the new addresses a day before the protocol's launch, which was found out to be the real participation value, as was found out earlier.
The graph below shows the address count for each of the protocol's launch. Based on this, we can see that Anchor is the most anticipated by the public. With an average of 20% APY for deposits and over 100% APY for borrowing at launch, it is no wonder that it's highly anticipated. Another interesting note is that the combined new user count for Pylon's Wave 1 and Wave 2 exceeds Mirror, meaning that Pylon's popularity is higher than Mirror at launch.
From the graph below, we can see that Anchor attracted more USD than the combined USD of all the rest. Anchor's high total onboarded USD shows confidence in Terra's stablecoins, since Anchor is mostly about borrowing and lending USTs. Terraswap's low amount of onboarded USD may have been caused by Uniswap's dominance in DEXes at the time and the fact that LUNA was not that well known during that time.
The graph of the average onboarded USD per user tells us which protocols do the wealthy prefer. Based on the graph, Anchor once again tops the chart, followed closely by Pylon Wave 2, which is the launch of the function to lock USTs for a period of time to gain newly launched tokens. Based on this, we can say that wealthier users prefer protocols that incentivizes UST locking than UST trading.
This dashboard explored how the price of LUNA and the launch of new protocols affect the inflow of new users to Terra. Based on the findings, we know that although the price of LUNA does affect the inflow of users, it is not the only factor affecting the growth of Terra. Other than that, it is also found out that the new protocols do not seem to affect the new user inflow at face value (if we compare it with the number of new addresses per day), however, when we compare it using the USD values of new users, a significant difference is observed. Total and Average Onboarded USD spikes are seen just a day before a new protocol launches, most probably as preparation to participate in the new protocol's launch. Based on the results, Anchor is the most anticipated in all 3 categories, which are the address count, the total onboarded USD, and the average onboarded USD. Pylon takes the second place, followed by Mirror. High participation rate of Anchor and Pylon signifies that users (mostly wealthier) are more interested in UST locking as a means of profit instead of UST trading.