DeFi
Decentralized finance (DeFi) refers to financial systems built on blockchain technology that operates outside of traditional financial mediation. It includes a variety of applications such as lending and borrowing platforms, prediction markets, stablecoins, and decentralized exchanges (DEXs). It enables participants to save, invest, trade, create markets, swap assets and more.
DeFi applications are designed to compete with (and ultimately replace) centralized financial systems. Most of them use open-source software, enabling anyone to reconstruct pre-existing DApps in an unrestricted and modular way.
Most DeFi solutions are built on smart contracts using Ethereum, the second-largest cryptocurrency platform in the world. The goal of DeFi is to create more accessible and transparent financial services for individuals and businesses, but investing is risky due to volatility and abundance of scams.