DeFi Tokens Plunge Amid Contagion: AAVE and ZRO Down 22%, LDO 19%, Santiment Reports

Gate News message, April 20 — DeFi tokens suffered steep declines over recent days as contagion from a bad debt event spread across multiple protocols, according to Santiment. AAVE fell 22%, LayerZero’s ZRO dropped 22%, Lido’s LDO declined 19%, Ethena’s ENA slid 13%, and Compound’s COMP lost 10%, while ETH remained flat.

LayerZero, which operated the bridge connecting the affected protocols, was repriced by markets as equally culpable to Aave, which held the bad debt. Ethena—which had zero exposure to the underlying rsETH collateral—still experienced a 13% decline, suggesting contagion fears extended beyond protocols with direct exposure. Compound, with only minor rsETH exposure, fell 10%, indicating cascading risk reassessment across the broader DeFi ecosystem.