Compound Protocol is a decentralized finance (DeFi) lending protocol based on the Ethereum blockchain, founded in 2017 by Robert Leshner and Geoffrey Hayes, with its mainnet launched on September 27, 2018.
The protocol allows users to deposit supported tokens into a liquidity pool to earn interest, and also allows borrowers to provide overcollateral to lend other assets. The entire process is executed automatically through smart contracts, without the need for traditional financial intermediaries.
Interest rates are not fixed but dynamically determined by supply and demand: when an asset has high liquidity and low demand in the pool, borrowing rates decrease, and deposit rates also decrease; conversely, when demand is high and liquidity is scarce, interest rates increase.
After depositing assets, users receive ERC-20 tokens called "cTokens" (such as cETH, cDAI, etc.), representing their share in the pool. Over time, the amount of underlying assets represented by these cTokens increases, thus generating returns.
