DeFi Rate
Posts
This Week In DeFi – December 8

This Week In DeFi – December 8

Alex Miguel
December 08, 2023

Happy Friday, DeFi readers!

This week…

Circle-backed Xion blockchain unveils testnet
ORDI becomes first BRC-20 to reach $1B market cap
Linea L2 introduces “DeFi Voyage” program
Mantle launches Ethereum liquid staking protocol

Circle-backed Xion blockchain unveils testnet

USDC-based blockchain Xion has unveiled its testnet this week, with a focus on "generalized abstraction" to simplify user experience.

It seeks to eliminate the complexities typically associated with crypto wallets and transactions, allowing users to both onboard and operate in a much easier fashion.

Xion is backed with around $11 million in funding from Circle Ventures and Animoca Brands, and uses the USDC stablecoin as its default currency.

1/ Today, we're incredibly proud to release XION's Generalized Abstraction whitepaper.
xion.burnt.com/whitepaper.pdf
XION is the first blockchain that enshrines user experience at the protocol level to enable mainstream adoption.
— Burnt (XION)🔥 (@burnt_xion)
2:19 PM • Dec 7, 2023

Together With Animus Technologies

Your chance to outperform bitcoin

What if you had a chance to outperform the best-performing major asset class in the last decade?

Since launching in 2020, Animus Technologies has returned 260.85% vs bitcoin 80.83% on an outright & risk-adjusted basis using proprietary AI and sentiment analysis. They also recently won Bitcoin Magazine’s ‘Bitcoin Alpha Competition’, receiving $1 million in seed capital.

The team is looking at taking on a limited number of new clients. Book a call today to see if they are right for you.

ORDI becomes first BRC-20 to reach $1B market cap

ORDI, the largest BRC-20 token in the Ordinals ecosystem, has surpassed a $1 billion market cap, experiencing a nearly 1,000% increase in market capitalization since November 5.

The success of ORDI reflects the growing prominence of the Ordinals ecosystem within the Bitcoin network, with various projects and tokens contributing to its popularity since its launch in January 2023.

Ordinals are similar to NFTs, allowing arbitrary data to be inscribed into a single Satoshi on the Bitcoin blockchain.

$ORDI is the first BRC20 over 1 billion marketcap
Congrats @domodata
— 💎 SheetFu🐒.magic (@ChartFuMonkey)
8:00 PM • Dec 4, 2023

Together With Ryze

Stop Waiting For The Next Bull Market

What if you were able to take advantage of short term price movements while you wait for the next bull market?

That’s exactly what Ryze offers, through the ultimate binary options trading experience. Binary options offer investors a way to trade against the market with only two possible outcomes: receive a fixed amount or nothing based on if you are right or wrong.

Ryze is simplifying non-custodial crypto binary options through a fast-paced and exhilarating solution. Stop waiting for the bull market and score a bonus trade when you open your first position!

Linea L2 introduces “DeFi Voyage” program

MetaMask creator ConsenSys is running an introductory program for its layer-2 scaling platform, Linea, called the Linea DeFi Voyage.

Linea looks to enhance Web3 adoption by addressing scalability and cost issues, leveraging zero-knowledge rollup technology.

Linea DeFi Voyage is a six-week gamification experience, offering users a firsthand experience with key DeFi platforms and protocols.

The Linea ecosystem already encompasses decentralized exchanges, lending protocols, a smart wallet, perpetual DEXes, and a SocialFi platform to provide a comprehensive end-to-end DeFi experience.

🚀We launched this pioneering ecosystem activation with 95+ partners focused on enriched user engagement, education & seamless UX
This is how we’re doing it 🤝
Keep reading below or in crazy detail here:
— Linea (@LineaBuild)
9:00 PM • Dec 4, 2023

Mantle launches Ethereum liquid staking protocol

Mantle, a DAO-led blockchain developer, has launched a liquid staking protocol on the Ethereum mainnet, allowing users to deposit ETH and participate in network staking through validator nodes.

The protocol introduces Mantle-staked ether (mETH), a liquid staking derivative token representing users' staked ether.

Governed by the Mantle decentralized autonomous organization, the protocol aims to address the concentration of ether stakes with major providers by diversifying available liquid staking solutions, offering users capital efficiency and sustainable yield.

🚨 Introducing a Mantle core product: Mantle LSP, a permissionless, non-custodial ETH liquid staking protocol!
Get your hands on $mETH, the value-accumulating receipt token that opens the gateway to expanded yield opportunities.
🟢 Check out the APY at: mantle.xyz/meth
— Mantle (@0xMantle)
10:07 AM • Dec 4, 2023

BRC-20 tokens & beyond

$ORDI has captured the attention of many this week, becoming the first BRC-20 token to reach a billion-dollar total valuation.

So, what better time to review what the BRC-20 token standard is, and why it came to be?

The BRC-20 token standard emerged as a new framework to mirror Ethereum's ERC-20 tokens, in a way that functions on the more simplistic Bitcoin network. Due to Bitcoin’s inability to create native tokens on its blockchain in the same manner as Ethereum and other newer chains, BRC-20 tokens work quite differently to the ERC-20 standard that it is named after.

BRC-20 “tokens” are crafted by associating individual satoshis (the smallest units of Bitcoin) with specific data through “inscriptions”. That is, marking regular Bitcoin units with additional data. In short, the innovation enables users to “hijack” a regular satoshi, and turn it into a marked token that has unique characteristics.

This enables users to engage in a broader range of functionalities, catching up to that of the Ethereum network – but with the security of the Bitcoin blockchain.

One significant argument against BRC-20 tokens is the potential strain on the Bitcoin network – particularly on nodes and validators – due to the larger data requirements associated with these tokens. This concern has led some of the more hardcore Bitcoin community to lash out against the innovation.

Fascinatingly, the influence of BRC-20 tokens has also extended to other blockchains – even though they can already create and facilitate regular tokens. New token standards have emerged, including PRC-20 on Polygon PoS, Ethscriptions on Ethereum, Doginals on Dogecoin, and Solana Inscriptions on Solana.

Although these inscriptions may seem redundant on newer networks, some arguments do support their creation and use. Notably, inscription-based tokens are much cheaper to transact with than regular tokens on those networks – most noticeably on Ethereum.

Will the BRC-20 craze last?