ARK’s Q3 DeFi report shows incentives propping up activity as Ethereum mainnet slips

ARK Invest’s DeFi Quarterly noted a broad recovery in the third quarter of 2026. The rebound was spurred largely by tokenized stocks, even though a large part of the activity is still reliant on brokerage distribution and token incentives. There was a drop in Ethereum’s mainnet revenue to ~$40.6 million from $63 million. Tokenized equities grow into a $50 billion market The report noted a glaring shift in the location traders choose to put their money. In fact, there was a ninefold increase in the trading of tokenized stocks on decentralized exchanges, hitting the $50 billion mark. Decentralized exchanges offer users the opportunity to swap assets in the absence of an intermediary. The $50 billion figure amounts to about 9% of spot DEX volume globally, up from ~1% in Q2.