Hey guys.
In this post, I want to talk about the Stakenet(XSN) project and explain that what are they doing.
Stay with me.
Stakenet is a Lightning Network-ready open-source platform for decentralized applications with its native cryptocurrency – XSN. It is powered by a Proof of Stake blockchain with trustless cold staking and Masternodes. Its use case is to provide a highly secure cross-chain infrastructure for these decentralized applications, where individuals can easily operate with any blockchain simply by using Stakenet and its native currency XSN.
Ok... but what does it actually do and solve?
The moonshot here is the DEX (Decentralised Exchange) that they are building. This is a lightning-network DEX with interchain capabilities. That means you could trade BTC directly for ETH; securely, instantly, cheaply, and privately.
Right now, most crypto is traded to and from Centralised Exchanges like Binance. To buy and sell on these exchanges, you have to send your crypto wallets on that exchange. That means the exchanges have your private keys, and they have control over your funds. When you use a centralized exchange, you are no longer in control of your assets, and depend on the trustworthiness of middlemen. We have in the past of course seen infamous exit scams by centralized exchanges like Mt. Gox.
The alternative? Decentralized Exchanges. DEX's have no central authority and most importantly, your private keys(your crypto) never leaves your possession and are never in anyone else's possession. So you can trade peer-to-peer without any of the drawbacks of Centralised Exchanges.
The problem is that this technology has not been perfected yet, and the DEX's that we have available to us now is not providing cheap, private, quick trading on a decentralized medium because of their technological inadequacies. Take Uniswap for example. This DEX accounts for over 60% of all DEX volume and facilitates the trading of ERC-20 tokens, over the Ethereum blockchain. The problem? Because of the huge amount of transactions that is occurring over the Ethereum network, this has lead to congestion(too many transactions for the network to handle at one time) so the fees have increased dramatically. Another big problem? It's only for Ethereum. You cant, for example, Buy LINK with BTC. You must use ETH.
The solution? Layer 2 protocols. These are layers built ON TOP of existing blockchains, that are designed to solve the transaction and scaling difficulties that crypto as a whole is facing today(and ultimately stopping mass adoption) The developers at Stakenet have seen the big picture, and have decided to implement the lightning network(a layer 2 protocol) into its DEX from the ground up. This will facilitate the functionalities of a DEX without any of the drawbacks of the CEX's and the DEX's we have today.
Heres someone much more qualified than me, Andreas Antonopoulos, to explain this
https://streamable.com/kzpimj 'Once we have efficient, well designed DEX's on layer 2, there won't even be any DEX's on layer 1'
Progress
Please see the latest Developer Update (11/1/21)
https://medium.com/stakenet/xsn-core-update-jan-2021-1f2b1f585b58 We are approaching the full release of the Stakenet DEX which will occur before the end of Q1 2021. The Stakenet team were the first to envision this grand solution and have been working on it since its conception in June 2019. They have been making steady progress ever since and right now, the DEX is in an open beta stage where rigorous testing is constant by themselves and the public. For a project of this scale, stress testing is paramount. If the product were to launch with any bugs/errors that would result in the loss of a users funds, this would obviously be very damaging to Stakenet's reputation. So I believe that the developers' conservative approach is wise.
As of now (26/1/21), Connext has been integrated into the DEX and the final stages of testing before full release are underway. Connext is a layer 2 solution for Ethereum which will enable ERC-20 tokens to be tradeable on the DEX. The first BTC-USDT(the biggest trading pair in crypto) trades our now taking place on the DEX!
https://twitter.com/XSNofficial/status/1347258023434018816 Where Can I Buy Stakenet?
Stakenet(XSN) is now available on one of Crypto's biggest tier 1 exchanges, Bitfinex.
https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/stakenet/markets/ Tokenomics
2.6 Metrics overview (from whitepaper)
Name Stakenet.
Ticker: XSN. Currency Type: Coin.
Consensus: Minting Proof of Stake, Trustless Proof of Stake.
Coinage: Enabled, 24 hours.
Encryption Algorithm: X11.
Block generation time: 60 seconds.
Block size: 1-4 MB.
Final block reward: 20 XSN.
Block reward distribution: 45% Masternodes, 45% staking, 10% treasury.
Masternode collateral: 15 000 XSN.
Governance: Decentralized democracy.
Funding: Decentralized treasury, no initial coin offering, no premine.
Lightning Network: Activated on mainnet.
On-chain scalability: 240 tx/s. On-chain transaction costs: ~0.00001 XSN/kB.
Off-chain scalability: Theoretically infinite tx/s.
Off-chain transaction costs: Virtually zero.
Cross-chain interface: Lightning Swaps, Tokenization Swaps.
XSN is slightly inflationary, much like ETH as this is necessary for the economy to be adopted and work in the long term. There is however a deflationary mechanism in place - all trading fees on the DEX get converted to XSN and 10% of these fees are burned. This puts constant buying pressure on XSN and acts as a deflationary mechanism. XSN has inherent value because it makes up the infrastructure that the DEX will run off and as such Masternode operators and Stakers will see the fee's from the DEX.
Conclusion We can clearly see that a layer 2 DEX is the future of cryptocurrency trading. It will facilitate secure, cheap, instant and private trading across all coins with lightning capabilities, thus solving the scaling and transaction issues that are holding back crypto today. I don't need to tell you the implications of this, and what it means for crypto as a whole. If Stakenet can launch a layer 2 DEX with Raiden Integration, It will become the primary DEX in terms of volume.
Stakenet DEX will most likely be the first layer 2 DEX(first-mover advantage) and its blockchain is the infrastructure that will host this DEX and subsequently receive its trading fees. It is not difficult to envision a time in the next year when Stakenet DEX is functional and hosting hundreds of millions of dollars worth of trading every single day.
To reiterate, Key highlights of Stakenet’s Layer 2 DEX:
- It provides instant and virtually feeless cross-chain trading.
- Users retain full custody of their funds at all times as they own the private key for their wallet.
- Projects and users can run their own hub of the DEX which adds further liquidity to it and can support their chosen currencies.
- “Vortex” enables the DEX to share liquidity with other exchanges, both centralized and decentralized.
- It is run entirely on their decentralized Masternode network.
- The community members who run a master node will earn a share of the fees earned from the DEX.
At $30 million market cap, I can't see any other potential investment right now with this much potential upside.
This post has merely served as in the introduction and a heads up for this project, there is MUCH more to cover like vortex liquidity, Masternodes, TOR integration... for now, here is some additional reading. Resources
Whitepaper
https://stakenet.io/Stakenet_Whitepaper.pdf Quick rundown
https://medium.com/stakenet/multi-currency-wallet-and-lightning-swaps-stakenet-solution-7d0dafe99105 X9's contributions to LTC
https://medium.com/stakenet/litecoin-foundation-and-x9-developers-announce-collaboration-510ca985b6 Exertive Proof of Stake
https://medium.com/stakenet/exertive-proof-of-stake-epos-4a999807f9e4 Great write-up of Cross Chain Proof of Stake (i.e. stake XSN, receive BTC)
https://medium.com/stakenet/posw-weekly-ccpos-cross-chain-proof-of-stake-de1ac87055cd The Cypherpunk Standard of Banking
https://medium.com/altcoin-magazine/the-cypherpunk-standard-of-banking-88f84a834180 Most recent Dev Update
https://medium.com/stakenet/xsn-core-update-jan-2021-1f2b1f585b58 Further reads
https://medium.com/stakenet TLDR; No. Do you want to make money? I'd start with learning how to read.
