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Enter Ethereum 2.0

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Crypto Research
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Ethereum was finally launched in 2015 and proved that programmability was incredibly powerful and equally dangerous. Performance was not the top priority at the time. More emphasis was placed on robustness and the ability to easily run a large network of nodes.

With more than $160 billion in locked value and thousands of projects running, the need for radically improved performance has become pressing.

The next generation of the Ethereum protocol will introduce three significant changes:

  • A move from PoW to PoS.
  • Introduce a sharded blockchain, basically multiple synchronized chains in parallel.
  • Replacing the Ethereum Virtual Machine with eWASM.

The move to proof-of-stake will be a quantum leap toward making Ethereum more energy efficient and carbon neutral. PoS means that validating nodes vote on transactions and get rewards for successfully submitting blocks to the blockchain. The network’s energy use will come from the computers running nodes, mostly standard desktop machines. Miners consumed 45 terawatt-hours of energy in 2021 as millions of high-end graphics cards churn away to compute the necessary calculations securing the network.

Sharding is a widely used process in database management where tables with high demand are spread out among multiple servers to make access more performant. Ethereum sharding will split its blockchain into multiple chains running in parallel and synchronizing to the so-called Beacon Chain. Sharding will improve Ethereum’s performance from a maximum of 35 transactions per second (TPS) to a theoretical maximum of 100,000.

Last but not least, the switch from the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) to eWASM, which stands for Ethereum Web Assembly, will mean that smart contracts can be written in most general programming languages, such as Rust, C++, Python and others — a big boost for developer access and productivity.

Ethereum 2.0 — The timeline to launch

Upgrading Ethereum is like open-heart surgery. There are thousands of projects and millions of active users, and hundreds of billions of value operate on the network, but any significant mishap would spell an irreparable loss of trust in the blockchain. Accordingly, Ethereum developers are cautious and test and retest every upgrade before rolling it out to the mainnet.

No fixed date for the launch of the next steps toward Ethereum’s future is set, much to the community’s chagrin, however. Nevertheless, the Eth2 Beacon Chain was successfully deployed in December 2020, and a successful merge of Ethereum to PoS Eth2 was demonstrated on a testnet in October 2021, representing an important milestone. 

The merge of Ethereum’s v1 mainnet to v2 is expected for May–June 2022. Miners will no longer be able to produce blocks after that. The shift from a single-threaded blockchain to sharding is expected a year after the merge, sometime in 2023. Eth2 stakers are in for a long ride: Unstaking requires a minor update after the sharding upgrade.

Ethereum 2.0 will be able to process up to 100,000 tps, and time-to-finality could be as little as six seconds, depending on the final implementation!

This article is an extract from the 80+ page Scaling Report: Does the Future of Decentralized Finance Still Belong to Ethereum? co-published by the Crypto Research Report and Cointelegraph Consulting, written by ten authors and supported by Arcana, Brave, ANote Music, Radix, Fuse, Cryptix, Casper Labs, Coinfinity, Ambire, BitPanda and CakeDEFI.

SW DAO Launches Automated Investing dApp on Polygon

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Crypto Research
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Wanting to provide users a seamless experience, SW DAO decided that creating an all-in-one dApp that incorporates their investing products is more than necessary.

Besides their previously launched new automated investing strategies on Polygon, SW DAO has now launched its new Crypto Trading dApp, merging all the existing products provided by SW DAO: the Alpha Portfolio, Yield Funds, Quantum Momentum, and many more structured products.

The new dApp is available for access beginning today, June 8th. The SW DAO dApp allows users to invest without doing continuously intensive market research, making the investing and trading journey more user-friendly for the average person.

SW DAO Crypto Trading dApp

In the cryptocurrency market, trading is one of the most popular ways to earn extra income. Automated trading strategies and Decentralized Finance have advanced the investing journey, taking it to the next level.

Using dApps like SW DAOs is more robust and flexible than centralized applications since they don’t require connectivity to a single centralized party to run. It means that enterprises can ensure minimal interruptions and downtime for maximum business continuity and resilience, benefiting your portfolio in the long run.

Second, because there is no centralized data storage, user data is not at risk in the event of a data breach or hacking attempt. This reason might encourage users to prefer decentralized apps over centralized apps if they prefer to self custody of their assets.

Then, being an all-in-one platform, a Crypto Trading dApp is one of the recommended choices in the DeFi investment area because people can quickly discover and invest in different products. Moreover, it helps users navigate without being redirected through multiple sites or waiting for pages to load, which leads them away from engaging with them.

Why Polygon?

Polygon is unique in that it can process transactions fast and cheaply. Its technology completes the transaction confirmation process and allows it to process transactions quickly, with an average block processing time of 2.1 seconds.

The investing journey with SW DAO

For years, SW DAO’s tokenized algorithms have outperformed the market, and SW DAO is sure that they will help users build an optimized portfolio.

Because public changelogs for websites and dApps are challenging to obtain, SW DAO will begin publishing public changelogs for its website and dApp shortly after its launch, demonstrating its ongoing improvements to attract new developers.

Stay updated

SW DAO is prepared for whatever the market throws its way. You can find more information on their official website and socials, Twitter or Telegram.

Betting with Crypto: Know where you stand legally

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Crypto Research
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Close-up bitcoins with cards and dices on wooden desk.

One of the key claims made for cryptocurrencies since they first entered the public consciousness has been that they will simplify financial transactions now and in the future. Of course, that claim was always something of a hostage to the understanding of legislative authorities worldwide, and crypto enthusiasts are learning that the hard way across a number of settings.

Let’s take as an example the question of betting with crypto. The world of casinos and sites like these betting sites not on Gamstop could be a lot simpler, and crypto coins could be part of that solution. However, it’s become ever more important to stop and think for a while when it comes to joining a crypto casino or placing a bet using Bitcoin, because there is now a greater degree of legislation when it comes to crypto, and not all of it makes much sense.

What is the problem with new and existing crypto laws?

Among the thorniest questions surrounding crypto is the tricky matter of how laws can differ among states and countries that sit right next to one another. A crypto bettor in France has to jump through hoops that a neighbor just across the German border may not. In short, due to the relative novelty of crypto as a currency, there is very little consensus on how it should be treated. Different jurisdictions variously see it as a currency, a form of property, and a store of value among other things. And while there is little to no settled law – because it’s all so new – it’s hard to know which laws in place right now will still be there in five years’ time.

Which countries have positive crypto legislation?

Even with a question so simple, the answer can be torturously complicated. There are some countries, for example, Sweden, where local betting providers must apply for a special license if they wish to allow the use of Bitcoin, while non-domestic casinos can do without one. Neighbouring Finland has no such differentiation between local and foreign – the provider must have a license, and that’s that. So it is easier for a Finnish casino to attract Swedish customers than to serve people living right next to their HQ.

So where are you banned from betting with crypto?

Inasmuch as there are laws designed to stop you, you aren’t banned from betting with crypto anywhere in the world. The more salient point is what your legal recourse would be if that betting went wrong for reasons beyond your control. In most cases, you’ll find you’re on your own because of jurisdictional questions. Bitcoin betting is technically illegal in the United States, in that it is illegal to offer the service to customers. It is not illegal for you to bet using Bitcoin in the United States – but if the casino takes your money and then folds, you’re not going to have any joy looking to local or regional authorities to get your money back.

Ethereum Staking and Lending Rates

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Crypto Research
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Ethereum 2.0 can’t come soon enough, as blocks were always full in 2021. The next iteration of Ethereum will be a proof-of-stake (PoS) network where validators need to have at least 32 ETH to vote on transactions.

Parts of this network are already parallel to the main PoW blockchain, and investors can stake their Ether on the new network. This stake is locked until the migration is complete, and until now, it’s unclear whether this will happen next year or even later.

Staking Eth2 is a strong indicator of trust. So far, 7% of all ETH is staked on Eth2. Compared to Solana, which has 76% of its SOL staked, this might seem low, but some perspective is needed. If the transition never succeeds, which is a possibility, these funds are lost.

Users with less than 32 ETH need to delegate their coins to other validators to collect rewards. Centralized exchanges such as Kraken have made that very comfortable and offer 5%–7% APY on staked Ether. Decentralized protocol Rocket Pool allows users to stake and unstake Eth2 at will with 4.3% APY. Plus, there’s a token.

Figure 1: Amount of ETH staked

Source: Beaconcha.in

Lending platform YouHodler pays 5.5% APY, with CoinLoan and BlockFi offering more than 4.5% each. Juicier gains are realized when providing liquidity to decentralized exchanges (DEX) such as SushiSwap, where pairing ETH with stablecoin TerraUSD (UST) yields 46% APY this December.

Initial coin distribution of Ether

Buterin and his early team often get a lot of flak for Ethereum’s alleged centralization. The truth is that the core team did get around 10% of all ETH in circulation. Even then, the exact distribution was a contested issue and led to some bad blood. After this initial distribution, the team had a crowd sale — arguably the first ICO ever — where investors could purchase Ether for Bitcoin. Thousands of individuals bought 60 million ETH, about half of the supply in 2021. This share represents Ethereum’s early community, which got well rewarded for their faith in a project headed by a scrawny 20-year-old.

Figure 2: Breakdown of Ethereum’s Initial Coin Distribution

Source: Etherscan.io

Compared to Solana and many other blockchains, Ethereum has little centralization. Conversely, the setup is not as squeaky clean as Bitcoin’s, where nothing was pre-mined.

This article is an extract from the 80+ page Scaling Report: Does the Future of Decentralized Finance Still Belong to Ethereum? co-published by the Crypto Research Report and Cointelegraph Consulting, written by ten authors and supported by Arcana, Brave, ANote Music, Radix, Fuse, Cryptix, Casper Labs, Coinfinity, Ambire, BitPanda and CakeDEFI.

TCG World Completes Largest Metaverse Commercial Real Estate Sale For $5,000,000

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Crypto Research
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TCG World recently announced an exciting new strategic partnership with Curzio Research Inc who have acquired 19 commercial real estate properties inside TCG World Metaverse for $5,000,000. The acquisition will mark one of the largest real estate purchases to date for virtual property inside the metaverse. Curzio Research plans on building its headquarters in the Asia region of TCG World, near WallStreetBets. This is where Curzio VIP members can meet with other investors, attend live events, educational seminars and conferences, listen to exclusive Wall Street Unplugged podcasts, and build an investment community.

Curzio Research, Inc. is a financial publishing company specializing in independent investment research and analysis. Curzio Research will initiate a capital raise of up to $4,000,000, which will be used to fund a portion of this TCG real estate acquisition and for general corporate purposes. This may include, but not be limited to, capital expenditures, acquisitions, infrastructure and personnel, development of products and services, and legal and accounting expenses.

“The metaverse is what the internet was supposed to be,” says Curzio Research founder, Frank Curzio. “A decentralized, permissionless place where individuals have the freedom to create and own their digital content.

“When researching the options, TCG World had all the elements — gamification, entertainment, social, and commerce — to create a true open metaverse. And its low fee structure incentivizes innovation for users and developers. We’re happy to be part of this pro-growth model in an industry that has incredible upside potential.” The Curzio Research headquarters is expected to be completed before the TCG World official launch, or before September 2022. For additional information on this deal, visit www.curzioresearch.com
TCG World, is one of the largest open-world metaverse projects currently in development on the blockchain and has recently started to roll out Alpha access to some of their users and investors. Everything inside TCG World is owned as an NFT – virtual land, cars, pets and even player avatars.

TCG World will be co-hosting The Metaverse Expo 2022, a 3-day event held at the Las Vegas Convention Center on 8th – 10th July 2022.  The event will bring over 6000 visitors from around the world and will cover topics within the Metaverse, NFT, Gaming, and Blockchain space.
These include:
• Introduction to Blockchain • Introduction to Cryptocurrencies and Digital Assets • Artificial Intelligence • Introduction to the Metaverse • Metaverse Architecture • Digital Fashion and Technology • Business and Web3 Economics • Metaverse Entrepreneurship • Decentralized Finance • eSports and Blockchain Gaming • Understanding the power of the Metaverse • Reinventing Education in the Metaverse • Metaverse applications powered by blockchain Tickets for The Metaverse Expo 22 are on sale now and can be purchased through their official website.

What is TCG World?
TCG World is an online open-world virtual gaming experience where players can earn TCG Coin 2.0, gather NFT collectibles, own virtual real estate, create, explore the game world, control their own online businesses, or just have fun. TCG World introduces a new approach to NFTs making it more than just a piece of art — now players can take their NFTs into the gaming world and play. Everything a player owns in the metaverse is an NFT — real estate, vehicles, pets, trophies, and even player avatars.

Real-World Use and Adoption for Ethereum

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Crypto Research
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Ether, or ETH, are the native tokens of Ethereum. It has no cap, and there are currently 118.9 million Ether in circulation. Ether is added when miners are paid for finding blocks (block rewards), and decreases as base transaction fees are burned. In 2021, Ethereum has a net annual inflation of 1.8%.

Ether’s price has been above $3,000 since August 2021, and its average market capitalization was $440 billion in October 2021. Starting in July 2020, its market cap rose in tandem with the TVL. In December 2021 the ratio of market cap to TVL was around 2.9x which places Ethereum between Fantom with just 0.76x and Solana with 4.4x. This is a good measure for how valuable a chain is in relation to the assets locked.

Figure 1: Ethereum’s price near all-time-highs in December 2021

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-2-1024x537.png
Source: Messari

Ethereum daily active addresses

The number of active addresses represents the number of accounts with at least one transaction on a given day, which is a good measure for the overall liveness of a blockchain. Ethereum surpassed 500,000 daily active addresses in the second half of 2021 and peaked at 800,000 in November 2021. Growth has been hampered by high transaction fees and longer wait times lately, as can be seen by the plateau on the graph above, which started in May 2020. The amount of active addresses is likely to stay at current levels until major technical upgrades become available.

Figure 2: Ethereum active addresses surpass 500,000 in the second half of 2021

Source: Messari

Ethereum protocol revenue and price-to-sales ratio

The Ethereum network currently employs a PoW consensus mechanism. More on this later. Miners secure the blockchain in return for block rewards and transaction fees. Block rewards

were 5 ETH per block until October 2017, when the Byzantium upgrade reduced the rewards to 3 ETH per block. The Constantinople upgrade in February 2019 went a step further, and now miners receive only 2 ETH per block or around 13,000 ETH per day for their services.

Figure 3: The total mining reward per day in ETH is the block rewards plus the transaction fees

Source: Etherchain.org

Transaction fees are now split into base and priority fees ever since Ethereum Improvement Proposal 1559 was implemented, part of the famed August 2021 London upgrade. Apart from different naming geography, it introduced a mechanism to burn the base transaction fees and only award miners the priority fee. The priority fee is like a tip that users add to their transactions to be processed quicker. Sometimes, substantial amounts are tipped during high transaction demand, like NFT launches. Burning the base fee will make Ether net deflationary when the network merges to its next iteration, Eth2, scheduled in 2022.

With Ether prices around $4,000, block rewards are close to $19 billion per year. Priority fees per day can peak up to 32,000 ETH. In the second half of 2021, they have evened out at an average of 1,500 ETH per day or $2.19 billion per year.

The price-to-sales ratio divides the market capitalization by the protocol revenue to make blockchains more comparable in the same way a price-to-earnings ratio does for stocks.

Ethereum has a 22.2x price-to-sales ratio, and a 214.9x ratio of price to transaction-fees. Both reflect a solid fundamental value of Ethereum when other blockchains such as Solana have a P/S of more than 30,000x.

 1 More information about Ethereum’s inflation here

This article is an extract from the 80+ page Scaling Report: Does the Future of Decentralized Finance Still Belong to Ethereum? co-published by the Crypto Research Report and Cointelegraph Consulting, written by ten authors and supported by Arcana, Brave, ANote Music, Radix, Fuse, Cryptix, Casper Labs, Coinfinity, Ambire, BitPanda and CakeDEFI.

Best App To Sell Bitcoin In Nigeria and Ghana — Prestmit

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Crypto Research
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Bitcoin has been the most popular and expensive cryptocurrency among over 10,000 coins in the crypto space. Its value has attracted a huge number of investors who want to leverage its market price to make fortunes for themselves.

Also, its potential in disrupting the stock market while retaining a decentralized nature across borders and territories has made many companies and few countries adopt Bitcoin use. Bitcoin trading is increasingly growing amongst cryptocurrency traders, with other financial institutions mulling on the bandwagon to have an encompassing stream of customers that trade in both Bitcoin and fiat currencies.

In Nigeria and Ghana, Bitcoin trading is a major way of becoming a millionaire within the twinkle of an eye as the exploits of cryptocurrency are already taking over the world. Its potential is massive as it does bullish prices that have in recent times reached an all-time high price.

However, because the markets are open every hour of the day and night, you must always be ready to buy when a good deal arises or to sell when a loss is too great.

So are you looking for how to sell Bitcoin? Do you need a trusted Bitcoin exchange that can boost your courage and finance in the crypto trading world? Prestmit is here for you!

Prestmit is a web and mobile-based Bitcoin exchange that is extolled for its simple user access and reliability in the world of Bitcoin trading. Launched in 2017, Prestmit has curated a niche for itself as one of the best apps to sell Bitcoin in Nigeria and Ghana.

Using the Prestmit app, new and existing users can easily sell gift cards for Bitcoin or convert BTC to either naira or cedi, which is enabled by a series of automated transaction processes. 

Furthermore, the Prestmit App is available on Google Play Store and the Apple Play Store for the most convenient and secure crypto-transactions yet to come.

Great Features Of Selling Bitcoin On The Prestmit App

1. Easy To Use

To create a positive user experience with a Bitcoin app, it must be simple to use. The Prestmit app, like the web platform, is simple with a user-friendly interface.

2. Instant Payment

Getting payment after selling your Bitcoin on the Prestmit app is considerably fast. Prestmit boasts of having the fastest payment time, which is between 5-10 minutes.

3. Security

A centralized security system and two-factor authentication (2FA) are just two of the many security features built into the Prestmit app to keep your account safe at all times.

4. Prompt Customer Support

Across the time, 24/7, the support team is available to assist new and existing Prestmit customers to resolve any issues related to their account management.

Bitcoin Products Available On The Prestmit App

  • Bitcoin to Naira
  • Bitcoin to Cedis
  • Gift Cards to Bitcoin

How To Sell Bitcoin On Prestmit App

1. Create An Account

Registering to create an account on the Prestmit app takes nothing less than one minute. 

2. Generate Address

This is having a Prestmit wallet address that would enable you to send and receive Bitcoin at will. This can be achieved by clicking on “Generate BTC wallet” on the Bitcoin wallet page.

3. Send Bitcoin

You can now send Bitcoin to your Prestmit wallet which will be converted to either naira or cedis. This process is in respect to the current exchange rate, which can be accessed using the rate calculator on your wallet page.

4. Get paid

After you have gotten three successive confirmations, cash will be transferred into your local bank account.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Can I send Bitcoin from any country?

Yes! Sending BTC is possible from any country, from any wallet, and even from any Bitcoin ATM!

2. What is the limit?

There is neither a maximum nor minimum limit.

Conclusion 

To keep up with the ever-changing nature of the Bitcoin market, Prestmit is constantly updating its mobile app to provide the best customer service possible to its users. Selling Bitcoin on the Prestmit apps assures a seamless transaction process.

Ethereum at full capacity since May 2021

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Crypto Research
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For many, Ethereum 2 can’t come soon enough, as Ethereum blocks have been consistently full for many months.

DeFi and Ethereum are almost synonymous. Ethereum smart contracts enable the trustless transactions that make up decentralized finance, and most projects developed on top of the “world computer.”

This research focuses on the fundamentals of real-world use and gives an overview of Ethereum’s scalability — or lack thereof. Finally, we will explore Ethereum’s astounding dominance in both NFT sales and value locked in DeFi.

Vitalik Buterin co-founded Ethereum in 2013. Due to legal challenges with Ethereum’s initial crowd sale, it took almost two years to launch the network on July 30, 2015. Buterin wanted to expand Bitcoin’s programmability radically. He saw blockchain-native programs as a powerful catalyst for usage and adoption.

His ideas were met with intense pushback by the Bitcoin developer community, so he started to pour his efforts into a project of his own, which he called Ethereum. After receiving a $100,000 grant from the Peter Thiel Foundation in 2014, he began assembling a core team of contributors.

Some of today’s most prominent figures in crypto were among early Ethereum developers, such as Charles Hoskinson, founder of Cardano; Gavin Wood, founder of Polkadot; Joseph Lubin, founder of ConsenSys; and Anthony Di Iorio from TMX. These heavy hitters embarked on a rocky journey, which saw them facing intense infighting among the team, massive delays caused by regulatory uncertainty and near bankruptcy. 

Ethereum finally launched and proved that programmability was incredibly powerful and equally dangerous. The initial coin offering (ICO) hype of 2017, DeFi summer and the NFT boom in 2020 did more for crypto adoption than anything else, while the DAO heist(1) nearly ended Ethereum’s existence in 2017.

Figure: The Ethereum network has been at full capacity since May 2021

Ethereum hit the ceiling of its transaction capability this year. Most of the time, blocks are at capacity, but transaction fees have skyrocketed to peaks of $10,000 during coveted NFT launches.

The situation has become untenable and frequently priced out participants with lower net worth. Other blockchains picked up the slack, and Ethereum now faces innovative competition from Solana, Avalanche and Fantom. 

Will Ethereum remain the predominant ecosystem and continue to be at the forefront of innovation and adoption? Or will it fall behind and get overtaken by blockchains with better performance and faster development?

1 See “The DAO: Chronology of a daring heist and its resolution”, Deloitte Blockchain Institute, September, 2016

This article is an extract from the 80+ page Scaling Report: Does the Future of Decentralized Finance Still Belong to Ethereum? co-published by the Crypto Research Report and Cointelegraph Consulting, written by ten authors and supported by Arcana, Brave, ANote Music, Radix, Fuse, Cryptix, Casper Labs, Coinfinity, Ambire, BitPanda and CakeDEFI.

Anticipated +60K Otherside land giveaway announced by Crypto Thots

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Crypto Research
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Crypto Thots, the NFT marketplace with Ethereum on Opensea that helps you become a P.I.M.P in the NFT Space, is thrilled to announce its highly anticipated minting date. Starting from the 8th of June 2022, it’ll offer its holders access to account creation and edition, NFTs, timed auctions, royalties, messenger, personalized activity feed, and much more. 

By being a part of their 30,000 and growing Discord users community, Crypto Thots NFTs holders can flex the Bored Ape Yacht Club and enjoy any airdrops that BAYC is making. Holders get guaranteed access to constant giveaways – such as the 13ETH giveaway in Decentraland – and have access to exclusive content created by their OnlyFans models. Therefore, users won’t have to worry about their needs being neglected at any step of the roadmap. 

“Crypto Thots set out to help its users achieve their passive income goals. To do so, until minting day, we’re giving away daily prizes for 5 random active users in the Crypto Thots community after they fulfill the invitation and level requirements. One week after minting day, on the 15th of June, we’ll be introducing the first +60K Otherside land-related massive giveaway happening.” – sajja.eth, Founder at Crypto Thots.

To cater to their holders’ financial needs, they are planning to: 

  • Give 20% of revenue back to each holder;
  • Give 10% of revenue back to a charity cause chosen by their holders;
  • Reveal information about the P.I.M.P coin — and how holders can use it to advance on the P.I.M.P path;
  • Introduce the PPI (PASSIVE P.I.M.P) concept, to provide its holders with free money in no time; 
  • Enable networking opportunities for pimps while partying with 3D thots at Crypto Thots’ club in Decentraland. 

“Our purpose is for our community to always be winning. That’s why all Crypto Thots NFT owners will be eligible for random airdrops and giveaways as long as their NFT is not listed for sale. By the way, the second land giveaway will take place one week after the first land giveaway – if the public sale sells out.” – sajja.eth, Founder at Crypto Thots 

About Crypto Thots 

Crypto Thots is the ultimate NFT marketplace flow with Ethereum on Opensea that bridges the gap between NFTs and online content providers. As it’s aiming to help you become a P.I.M.P in the NFT Space and get rewarded for it, it gives you access to 3,333 thots that have found their way to the blockchain and a community of 30,000 and growing Discord users. Rewards include the latest developments, the best information, and the ultimate thottery. 

Learn more about Crypto Thots here. 

DeFi on Bitcoin

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Crypto Research
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Bitcoin’s design has unique characteristics that make it impossible to perform certain actions, and this has led developers and users to seek greener pastures in the Ethereum ecosystem. However, the same drawbacks conversely make Bitcoin more secure and stable.

In the article about Bitcoin’s Script protocol language, we discussed that many applications are not possible on Bitcoin due to its limited instruction set.

That’s why there will never be Bitcoin-native DeFi applications because the underlying smart contracts (a fancy name for tiny programs that self-execute and run natively on a blockchain) need a complete instruction set.

Script allows the creation of something called Atomic Swaps, however. You might have noticed that Bitcoin developers are almost as creative as Apple’s marketing department in finding awe-inspiring names for their products. Avoiding undue technicality here, Atomic Swaps allow Bitcoin to be exchanged with coins of other blockchains such as Litecoin or Ethereum in one transaction and without intermediaries. The exact mechanism involves Hash Time Locked Contracts and is beyond the scope of this research.

Only two projects offer decentralized financial services on top of Bitcoin — DeFiChain and Portal.finance.

DeFiChain

DeFiChain uses an intelligent way to secure transactions on its own chain by storing cryptographic representation to the Bitcoin blockchain every 30 minutes. DeFiChain’s own network is fast and tailored to decentralized finance by expanding Bitcoin’s Script language just enough to allow building, lending, staking and tokenizing functionality without becoming Turing complete and compromising on security.

DeFiChain went live in 2020 and introduced the ability to create digital tokens from stocks in November 2021. Users can currently get up to 400% APR when providing liquidity with Tesla, Google and other stocks in pairs with stablecoins.

The download of a proprietary wallet is necessary to participate. Thanks to rapid innovation and its clever security mechanics, DeFiChain has attracted more than $1.8 billion of assets to its applications.

Total value locked in DeFi on Bitcoin

Portal.finance has not been released to the public yet. Investors can start a whitelisting process to participate in the creation, and Portal announced $650 million of funds pledged to its development. 

DeFiChain is the only running layer-two decentralized exchange on Bitcoin, and the total value locked (TVL) on Bitcoin is the same — $1.8 billion. Watching out for Portal’s start and traction is recommended for anyone interested in this unique space.

Summary

Seen in a more poetic way, Bitcoin seems like the wise grandfather of modern cryptocurrencies. And while it may be considered old-fashioned, its stringent adherence to core values makes it inherently trustworthy and commands great authority.

DeFi has arrived on top of Bitcoin. While Ethereum allows native financial decentralized applications (DApp), transaction fees for providing liquidity to exchange pools have frequently exceeded $100 and occasionally topped $1,000. Layer-two solutions on top of Ethereum are all the rave now, so there’s no reason to think of layer-two DeFi as “less real” than layer one.

Bitcoin is still a valid synonym for crypto as a whole, and Taproot, Lightning Network, and layer-two DeFi mean it is more than just the first cryptocurrency, it is still a formidable competitor for the blockchain foundation of the global decentralized finance market.

This article is an extract from the 80+ page Scaling Report: Does the Future of Decentralized Finance Still Belong to Ethereum? co-published by the Crypto Research Report and Cointelegraph Consulting, written by ten authors and supported by Arcana, Brave, ANote Music, Radix, Fuse, Cryptix, Casper Labs, Coinfinity, Ambire, BitPanda and CakeDEFI.

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