DeFi must return to its P2P origins.

Opinion by: Jean Rausis, co-founder of SmarDex

Decentralized finance (DeFi) began with a clear vision: to enable a global, permissionless financial system built on peer-to-peer (P2P) transactions, free from the constraints of traditional finance (TradFi). 

Early decentralized lending platforms embraced that vision by connecting lenders and borrowers directly, allowing them to negotiate their terms without TradFi’s rigidities. 

Unfortunately, over time, most of these DeFi protocols drifted away from this ethos, abandoning true P2P interactions…