Arbitrum, the most important Ethereum layer-2 protocol, has launched a brand new initiative designed to channel liquidity into decentralized finance.
The DeFi Renaissance Incentive Program (DRIP), introduced on Sept. 3, will allocate as much as $40 million in rewards to customers performing focused on-chain actions reasonably than merely producing consideration.
This system, structured by Entropy and powered by Merkl, will likely be managed by Entropy Advisors beneath the path of ArbitrumDAO. In line with the blockchain community, roughly 80 million ARB tokens have been earmarked for incentives throughout 4 distinct “seasons,” every specializing in a unique nook of DeFi.
The primary season, which runs from Sept. 3, 2025, by means of Jan. 20, 2026, prioritizes looping leverage on lending markets.
Throughout this section, customers can earn as much as 24 million ARB in rewards by borrowing in opposition to yield-bearing ETH and stablecoin belongings on accepted platforms.
In line with Arbitrum, the construction is performance-based and protocol-agnostic, which means it would reward borrowing demand throughout a number of markets reasonably than focus liquidity in a single venue. Collaborating platforms embody Aave, Morpho, Fluid, Euler, Dolomite, and Silo, with collateral choices resembling wstETH, eUSDC, and USDe.
Ethereum L2 ecosystem
The inducement scheme arrives at a time when competitors amongst Ethereum scaling options is accelerating.
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Information from analytics platform Growthepie reveals that just about 13% of Ethereum’s software income now originates on layer-2 networks.
On this house, Arbitrum retains a commanding lead throughout the ecosystem. Information from L2beat locations its whole worth secured at greater than $19.1 billion, outpacing Coinbase’s Base at $14.7 billion and OP Mainnet at $3.6 billion.
These numbers mirror how Ethereum’s broader layer-2 ecosystem is maturing shortly, with networks competing to draw builders, customers, and liquidity at scale.
Contemplating this, the Ethereum Basis has moved to scale back fragmentation throughout these networks.
In an Aug. 29 replace, it introduced the Ethereum Interoperability Layer (EIL) as a trustless framework that allows transactions throughout totally different layer-2s.
The Basis described EIL as a solution to give customers the expertise of “one Ethereum” whereas preserving its core rules, together with censorship resistance, privateness, and open-source growth.
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