MakerDao’s DAI is the most popular and close to decentralized stable coin in crypto ecosystem (cough, cough… sorry about all the LUNA & UST posts on this blog, we misunderstood its capabilities). Anyone can borrow DAI by depositing one of the dozens of collaterals approved on MakerDAO. The most common collateral used to borrow DAI on MakerDAO is Ether token.
The other two popular tokens in crypto ecosystem are USDC & USDT. The USDC & USDT tokens are backed by US Dollars deposited in banks and various securities and they are mostly considered as non-decentralized! Why so? Because what backs USDC/USDT is an actual US Dollar and the US Dollar is centrally controlled by US Government. This is where DAI shines in decentral land, though some of the collateral on MakerDAO is USDC.
Ok let us examine how popular is DAI and compare it with USDC & USDT on Ethereum blockchain (the mother of all blockchains!). The following chart shows the amount of tokens (roughly equivalent to US Dollars as they are stable coins) transferred around in Ethereum transactions on daily basis.
Usage of DAI on Ethereum has been significantly on par with USDC & USDT on most of the days. And on few days it around 2021 Dec its usage is skyrocketed.
So what are blockchain users using DAI for? Lets us explore what they are doing in the following chart with the help of raw Etherum events available on Flipside Crypto database. As you notice in the chart below, the most popular operation performed using DAI is transferring tokens. DAI tokens are transferred between two users or between an user and a smart contract application.
Here is another view of transactions performed using DAI on ethereum blockchain. About 72% of transactions logged in Ethereum data warehouse for DAI are related to token transfers!