Enso Powers 82% of ether.fi PAXGy Volume as Gold Holders Trade 24/7

Enso has integrated its onchain execution infrastructure with ether.fi to enable seamless conversions between standard tokenized gold and Paxos Labs’ yield-bearing gold asset, PAXGy. This move allows decentralized finance users to access institutional gold leasing returns without leaving their primary application, bridging the gap between traditional bullion markets and 24/7 digital asset liquidity.

What was announced

Enso is now the primary engine for ether.fi users moving between PAX Gold (PAXG) and PAXGy. While PAXG represents one fine troy ounce of gold held in London vaults, PAXGy is designed to grow in ounce terms by deploying reserves into the institutional gold leasing market. The integration utilizes Enso’s routing architecture to handle cross-chain execution, particularly for users holding bridged assets across different blockchain environments.

Activity routed through Enso during the first month of PAXGy's availability, from 24 September to 27 October 2026, revealed several key trends in user behavior:

• Weekend demand: 39% of PAXGy volume was executed on weekends, a period when traditional gold markets are closed.
• Migration to yield: 87% of buy volume originated from existing PAXG holdings, indicating that gold holders are actively choosing assets that offer returns.
• Transaction size: The median PAXGy trade was approximately three times larger than standard PAXG trades performed via Enso.
• Cross-chain routing: 81.8% of trades initiated on the Optimism network, where ether.fi users hold bridged PAXG, and were routed to the Paxos Labs vault on Ethereum for minting.

In total, Enso has accounted for 82% of the PAXGy acquired by ether.fi users since the token's launch. The returns for PAXGy accrue through the exchange rate between PAXGy and PAXG, meaning each token becomes redeemable for an increasing amount of gold over time.

"People naturally want the flexibility to manage their gold on their own schedule. In PAXGy's first five weeks, nearly two in five dollars routed through Enso moved over weekends, when traditional markets are closed. The routing architecture we built for ether.fi is inherently reusable, meaning any wallet or fintech can now seamlessly unlock the exact same on demand access to tokenized gold through a single, simple integration,"

Connor Howe, Co-Founder and CEO of Enso

The companies involved

Enso provides the execution infrastructure required for complex onchain transactions, focusing on simplifying the routing process for fintechs and decentralized applications. The firm acts as a middleware layer that connects various liquidity sources and chains to provide a unified user experience. Paxos Labs, the issuer of both PAXG and PAXGy, is a major player in the regulated blockchain infrastructure space, known for its focus on tokenizing real-world assets and providing stablecoin solutions. By launching PAXGy, Paxos has introduced a mechanism for retail and decentralized participants to access the gold leasing market, a sector traditionally reserved for large-scale institutional players.

ether.fi operates in the decentralized finance space, offering users tools to manage and earn returns on a variety of digital assets. The platform has increasingly focused on expanding its offerings beyond native crypto assets to include diversified, yield-bearing instruments that maintain institutional-grade security and self-custody features. Together, these companies are attempting to modernize gold ownership by integrating it into the broader DeFi ecosystem.

What FF News has reported before

FF News recently covered the initial rollout of the yield-bearing gold token when Paxos Labs Launches PAXGy: The First Gold-Backed Token to Offer Yield in Bullion Terms. This followed our report on ether.fi’s broader expansion into traditional financial services, where Ether.fi Taps MoonPay to Power Self-Custodial Neobank with Unified Payments Stack. Additionally, Enso’s role in bridging traditional and digital markets was highlighted when Enso Launches on Robinhood Chain to Unlock Composable Stock Token Access for Fintechs, demonstrating the company’s ongoing strategy to provide execution layers for diverse asset classes across multiple blockchain networks.

What this means

This integration signals a shift in how "safe haven" assets are utilized within the fintech ecosystem. By moving gold from a static store of value to a productive, yield-generating asset, the industry is challenging the traditional limitations of bullion investment. The high percentage of weekend trading and cross-chain routing suggests that the primary demand for these products comes from users who value the 24/7 availability of crypto markets over the rigid hours of legacy exchanges. However, the concentration of volume through a single execution layer like Enso highlights a growing dependency on specialized middleware to navigate the fragmentation of liquidity across different blockchain networks.