While the crypto market continues its volatile course, two major platforms decided to cease operations this week. ZeroLend, which provides lending services in the decentralized finance space, and Parsec, an on-chain analytics company, announced that they are shutting down due to increasing costs, decreasing liquidity, and changing market dynamics. These recent developments have also strengthened expectations that the consolidation process in the sector may accelerate.
ZeroLend closes after three years
ZeroLend announced that it will cease operations after three years of activity. In a message shared on Discord, the project's co-founder and CEO, Ryker, stated that the current business model is not sustainable. The team announced that a "orderly and transparent liquidation process" will be carried out and that users should withdraw their funds from the platform.
Positioned as a multi-chain lending protocol that does not offer custody services, ZeroLend offered products in areas such as Layer 2 solutions, liquid restakeable tokens, real-world assets, and BTCFi. The project, which completed a $3 million seed funding round in 2024 at a valuation of $25 million; Consensys had received support from investors such as Polygon Ventures and Morningstar Ventures. However, increasing operational difficulties, decreasing on-chain activity, and security risks led the project to a dead end. Ryker stated that liquidity had dropped significantly on some supported networks, some oracle providers had terminated their services, making revenue generation difficult. The team noted that lending protocols were already operating with low margins, and that the increasing risk of attacks and fraud attempts had worsened the situation.
Following the news of the closure, the platform's native token, ZERO, experienced a sharp decline in value. The token fell by 45 percent in the last 24 hours, while the monthly loss reached 91 percent and the annual loss exceeded 99 percent. ZeroLend joined the ranks of DeFi startups such as Alpaca Finance, which closed after announcing losses, and Polynomial, which chose to end the project rather than issue a token.
Parsec bids farewell after five years
Parsec, which operated in the field of on-chain analytics, also announced that it has ceased operations after five years. The company announced its closure via X, stating, "Parsec is closing." CEO Will Sheehan stated that the market had shifted direction and that they had not been able to adapt sufficiently to this change.
Founded in early 2021, Parsec was known for its DeFi and NFT-focused data streams. However, the failure of leverage demand in the spot DeFi lending market to return to previous levels after the FTX crash, and the decline in NFT volumes, weakened its business model. In 2025, NFT sales volume fell to approximately $5.63 billion, while average sales prices also decreased compared to the previous year.
Parsec, which received investments from major players such as Uniswap, Polychain Capital, and Galaxy Digital, grew rapidly during the bull run when Bitcoin rose from $36,000 to $60,000. However, with the shift in the sector, the company struggled to maintain product-market fit. Industry representatives argue that the fragmented liquidity structure is at the root of the closures. The distribution of liquidity among different exchanges, custodians, and blockchains; This makes price stability and a sustainable revenue model more difficult. The need for a more integrated and reliable infrastructure for institutional participation is emphasized. On the other hand, the generally weak market outlook also exacerbates the situation. As the Bitcoin price has declined in recent months, the increase in search trends for phrases like "Is Bitcoin heading for zero?" reflects the deterioration in investor psychology.
