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Basis Desk
DeFi · 1 min read

Tether and Circle Lead Crypto Revenue Rankings as Stablecoins Dominate

Tether logged $500.25 million and Circle generated $204.75 million in monthly protocol revenue, outpacing decentralized applications and major blockchains.

Neutral
$USDT $0.9997 0.0% $USDC $1.00 +0.0% $ETH $2,681 −0.8% $TRX $0.3346 +0.3% $UNI $8.93 −8.7% $HYPE $88.74 −3.7%

Key points

  • Tether generated $500.25 million and Circle earned $204.75 million in 30-day protocol revenue via reserve yields.
  • Hyperliquid and Pump retained $55.16 million and $52.47 million over 30 days, leading decentralized applications.
  • Ethereum burned $3.62 million in fees over 30 days, trailing Tron's $23.39 million and Canton's $48.71 million.

Stablecoin issuers Tether and Circle continue to capture the vast majority of on-chain and crypto-adjacent protocol revenue, according to DefiLlama data updated on Sept. 28 1. Tether generated $17.55 million in revenue over a 24-hour period, lifting its 30-day haul to $500.25 million from yields on investments backing $USDT, such as U.S. Treasury bills, repos, commercial paper, and secured loans 1. Circle followed with $7.25 million over 24 hours and $204.75 million over 30 days, earned across cash-equivalent reserves and Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol fees 1.

Outside of fiat-backed asset issuers, specialized trading infrastructure captured significant cash flows. Token launchpad Pump generated $2.46 million in daily revenue and $52.47 million over the trailing 30 days across its bonding curve cuts, terminal charges, and mobile app swaps 1. Perpetual exchange Hyperliquid recorded $1.34 million in 24-hour revenue and $55.16 million over 30 days, routing the majority of derivative and spot order book fees to its Assistance Fund to buy $HYPE tokens 1.

Base-Layer Fees Lag Behind Application Yields

Base layer networks registered comparatively modest fee revenue. Ethereum permanently burned $443,602 in $ETH base and blob fees over 24 hours, bringing its 30-day burn revenue to $3.62 million 1. Tron burned $521,586 in $TRX fees over the same daily window, reaching $23.39 million over the month 1. Meanwhile, Canton logged $1.88 million in daily fee burns and $48.71 million over 30 days 1.

Decentralized exchange Uniswap brought in $347,857 over 24 hours and $15.67 million over 30 days as fee-switch mechanisms across versions V2, V3, and V4 directed revenue toward buying back and burning $UNI across multiple networks 1. Other notable revenue producers included World Liberty Financial, which gathered $416,723 in daily yields from USD1 reserves invested in Fidelity money market funds, and prediction platform Polymarket, which retained $323,558 over 24 hours after distributions 1.

Sources

  1. [1] Protocol Revenue Rankings - DeFi Fees Retained - DefiLlama — defillama.com, September 28, 2026

Written by Basis Desk's newsroom system from the primary sources above and machine-verified against them before publication. Market figures marked "at the time of writing" come from live exchange data. Report an error: hello@basisdesk.news.

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Not financial advice. Basis Desk publishes information, not recommendations. Crypto assets are volatile and you can lose what you invest.