Helium network, coined ‘The People’s Network’’ is taking real-world adoption of cryptocurrencies to new heights. Helium’s native cryptocurrency (HNT) is used to incentivise individuals around the world to provide coverage on a global peer-to-peer wireless network. This is done using a Helium compatible hotspot, which to date provides coverage for low-power IoT devices.
Traditional networks such as WiFi do not suit IoT devices well because of their lower range compared to other types of networks such as LoRaWaN. To solve this problem, Helium pioneered LongFi, which represents a mixture of LoRaWaN and blockchain technology. In the past, there were not enough incentives for participants to operate LoRaWaN hotspots resulting in higher costs for companies using IoT devices. With the introduction of LongFi and using HNT to reward participants to grow the decentralised network, IoT companies now have a cheaper alternative to use. Helium has already secured multiple partnerships with IoT companies, such as Salesforce, Lime, Airly, Nobel Systems, and more.
Previously on Helium, hotspots used to not only transmit data to IoT devices, but also play a role in the consensus of valid transactions. In recent times, Helium has experienced immense growth, which has impacted network performance whilst hotspots were involved in consensus. As 86,540 Helium-compatible hotspots have been set-up around the world (at 39% MoM growth), it has been harder for hotspots to secure the network. This is because Helium-compatible hotspots had built-in hardware specifications that limited the number of hotspots that could take part in consensus per epoch and the addresses of hotspots were not static, making it harder to reconnect if a block producer (hotspot) crashed during consensus. Low powered hardware (hotspots) using consumer-grade (personal) internet was a risk to Helium network and exposed to attacks such as DoS. Not only was network security at risk but incentives to secure the network in consensus also decreased as more hotspots joined the network (because new hotspots diluted consensus rewards from other hotspots).
For these reasons, Helium governance proposed in HIP-25 to introduce validators that use high-end servers and enterprise-grade internet with specialised experience in securing networks to help improve block performance and alleviate the consensus pressure from hotspots. The governance proposal passed and validators are now live on Helium network as of July 8th. There are now 1802 validators online on Helium network as of time of writing, translating to 19.96% of the whole network (HNT) being staked (18.02m).
We recently released research into the updated staking economics of Helium and how it improves the utility of HNT. Introducing validators into Helium network importantly assists network performance and block propagation and results in reliable returns for stakers.
We are excited that Helium governance has voted on introducing validators into the Helium network ecosystem and we have every intention to contribute to the network’s long-term success by ensuring the security of it.
Helium’s network is unique in that delegations are not currently possible. For this reason, we support Helium network with our NaaS offering. For information on pricing, please contact whitelabel@chorus.one. To read about the benefits of our NaaS service for those interested in staking HNT, please visit: https://chorus.one/products/whitelabel-staking/
Epoch: An epoch in Helium is 30 blocks. A block occurs roughly every 60 seconds. Thus, each epoch is lasting around 30 minutes. Staking rewards are distributed at the end of each epoch.
Minimum Bond: 10,000 HNT
Helium APR (as of 14/07/2021): ~11%
Chorus Commission: Contact whitelabel@chorus.one for pricing of HNT NaaS offering
Withdrawal Delay: After withdrawing, your staked funds will only become accessible after a 5-month cooldown period has passed.
Slashing: Slashing is not currently possible on Helium.
Partial Staking: Partial staking of HNT is not possible with Chorus One as we are operating a non-custodial staking service.
Overstaking: Overstaking on Helium does not earn additional rewards (i.e. a node with 15,000 HNT staked and a node with 10,000 HNT staked earns the same rewards). To earn more rewards, HNT holders need to launch multiple nodes with 10,000 HNT each.
Injective is a decentralised exchange (DEX) that facilitates permissionless cross-chain derivative trading.
Since DeFi summer in 2020, there has been an explosion of innovation in the decentralised exchange space. Automated market makers (AMMs) that use mathematical formulas and liquidity pools to calculate token prices instead of order books, have become the standard for swapping tokens on decentralised exchanges. AMMs are practical and accessible, no KYC is required of users and anyone can create pools of assets to be traded against. However, AMMs have been a victim of their own success. As popularity of AMMs has risen, so too have issues that users experience when interacting with them (such as high gas fees and front-running). AMMs are also limited when it comes to interoperability and only spot trading can be done using AMMs. Injective solves the problems suffered by AMMs by creating an interoperable order-book based decentralised exchange that acts as a layer-2 sidechain built using Tendermint-based consensus.
Injective has EVM-compatibility built on top of it’s Cosmos-SDK chain, meaning users experience a fast finality and interoperable network with the benefits of Ethereum tooling. Injective is using Tendermint consensus, which allows trades to be made cheaply and with 1 second finality. Injective is also IBC-compatible, meaning it is able to connect with hundreds of other networks that have been built with IBC compatibility to facilitate cross-chain interoperable trading. On top of this, Injective has its own Ethereum <> Injective bridge for users wanting to bridge their Ethereum ERC-20 tokens into and out of Injective. What is interesting here is that Injective is not limited to interoperability within Cosmos and Ethereum. Injective will also be interoperable with Polkadot in the near future via Moonbeam. It is not hard to envision a future where assets from multiple networks will be bridged onto Injective and be available to be traded with cheap fees and 1 second finality. Injective could potentially be the most interoperable decentralised order-book exchange seen-to-date.
The possibilities for a fast and interoperable order-book decentralised exchange are limitless. Anyone in Injective can also propose an arbitrary derivative market for INJ token holders to vote on. A scalable, interoperable, innovative and community-driven DEX that gives users permissionless access to any derivatives market in the world and is exactly the type of use case that crypto is made for. We are excited to announce our support for Injective and look forward to facilitating the network’s long-term success.
Injective uses the standard DPoS staking mechanism found in the Cosmos-SDK. Users can delegate their INJ tokens to Chorus One to receive a share of rewards generated by the network.
Validating Rights: The weight of validators such as Chorus One is determined by the amount of staking tokens (INJ) bonded as collateral.
INJ Inflation: 7%
Staking Reward Rate: Rewards from staking INJ will vary depending on the inflation and total amount of tokens that are staked at a given time. Learn more about the details of staking reward rates for chains built using Cosmos SDK here.
Chorus Commission: 7.5%
Withdrawal Delay: After withdrawing, your staked funds will only become accessible after the unbonding period (1 day) has passed. It takes a further 7 days withdraw INJ back to Ethereum.
Slashing: You can get slashed (loss funds) in case the validator you are delegated to commits an offense. Make sure to do due diligence to minimize this risk. Offences include double-signing (5% slashing penalty for delegators) and downtime (no slashing penalty, validator is ‘jailed’ and delegators miss out on staking rewards for minimum 2 hours).
Re-Staking: You need to withdraw rewards and re-stake them with some frequency if you want to make use of compounding returns.
Minimum delegation: There is no minimum delegation.
Stake your INJ: https://staking.injective.network/validators
Learn to delegate: Equinox Staking Guide
Wallets: Metamask
Block Explorer: https://explorer.injective.network/
Chorus One Validator Address: injvaloper14yeq3lkajldaggj28hmq8xng9xux7x5g46hezv
Today, we are excited to announce our staking partnership with Zero Knowledge Validator (ZKV), a collective of blockchain entrepreneurs, researchers, and developers focused on advancing the adoption of privacy and zero-knowledge technologies across multiple blockchain ecosystems.
Chorus One will provide node infrastructure to enable the Zero Knowledge Validator team to focus on privacy-focused initiatives and to participate in network governance representing their community and mandate. We will initially operate the Zero Knowledge Validators on Cosmos and Osmosis, with other networks to follow in the future. By delegating to the Zero Knowledge Validator nodes, ATOM and OSMO holders can support ZKV’s mission while ensuring their tokens are staked with the industry-leading reliable, secure, and diversified node infrastructures that Chorus One has built over the past three years.
The ZKV team, led by Anna Rose and Will Harborne, is active on the forefront of privacy research and development in the Ethereum, Cosmos, Polkadot, NEAR, and Mina blockchain ecosystems. Anna, who is hosting one of the most esteemed crypto podcasts (Zero Knowledge Podcast), is a pillar in the community and has provided a platform for privacy-focused researchers and builders to come together through a series of high-quality events such as the Zero Knowledge Summit, hackathons, online webinars, and more. Will, co-founder of the zk-STARK-based decentralized exchange Deversifi, has a vast network and experience in building scalable, privacy-preserving applications. Together with their collaborators and team of researchers and developers, ZKV provides invaluable help to projects and entrepreneurs to develop and grow their privacy-focused applications.
We are thrilled to be able to provide our services and work closely with ZKV. We expect this collaboration to increase our own knowledge and involvement in the promising field of privacy-preserving technologies and are looking forward to helping the ecosystems we are a part of tap into the resources and support provided by the ZKV team.
If you are interested in learning more, join the upcoming ZKV online event this Wednesday (June 30) focusing on privacy in the Cosmos ecosystem, which will also feature our CCO Felix Lutsch during the panel discussion. Register here: https://hopin.com/events/privacy-in-cosmos
Our mission is to help stakeholders participate and shape the decentralized networks they are a part of. Aside from accepting delegations on our own public nodes and building protocols to advance the staking ecosystem, we are also providing infrastructure services to stakeholders seeking to participate in staking and network governance themselves. To learn more about how we assist our partners that include institutions and companies like Zero Knowledge Validator in their exploration and participation in the staking ecosystem, visit our whitelabel node product offering at: https://chorus.one/products/whitelabel-staking
Chorus One is offering staking services and building tools that advance the Proof-of-Stake ecosystem.
Website: https://chorus.one
Twitter: https://twitter.com/chorusone
Telegram: https://t.me/chorusone
Newsletter: https://substack.chorusone.com
Zero Knowledge Validator champions privacy and zero-knowledge technology across the blockchain ecosystem through various initiatives such as research, content, and events.
Website: https://zkvalidator.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ZKValidator
We are pleased to announce that we have onboarded Osmosis, a heterogeneous, interoperable automated market maker protocol built on the Cosmos SDK that gives users and LPs flexibility and customisation never before seen in existing AMMs.
Osmosis is governance-first, it places emphasis on governance having a maximum level of customisation on protocol parameters so it can keep the protocol competitive in the long-run.
Osmosis is likely to introduce a new wave of innovation and creativity for AMMs as participants have the accessibility and flexibility to customise all aspects of an AMM. LPs can select their time horizons for providing liquidity, third-parties can incentivise pools ad-hoc, governance can distribute OSMO rewards where they deem fit, pool creators can play with mathematical expressions (curves) for lower-slippage swapping and users can swap assets cross-chain using the Interblockchain Communication (IBC) protocol, whose usage in the Cosmos ecosystem has been kickstarted following the chain’s launch this weekend:
Osmosis is airdropping a portion of OSMO to those who were holding ATOM when the screenshot was taken for the quadratic fairdrop. You can see if you are eligible here. Without doing anything, holders of $ATOM taken on the day of the blockchain screenshot receive 20% of their allocated OSMO rewards. To achieve the other 80% of allocated rewards, 4 steps are required by $ATOM holders within the first two weeks, outlined below:
Further information about who can claim the airdrop and how to claim it can be found here and here
Osmosis uses the standard DPoS staking mechanism found in the Cosmos SDK. Users can delegate their OSMO tokens to Chorus One to receive a share of rewards generated by the network.
Epochs: Osmosis uses epochs to account for reward distribution. There is 1 epoch per day. Therefore 1 epoch is ~14440 blocks. Staking rewards are distributed at the end of each epoch.
Validating Rights: The weight of validators such as Chorus One is determined by the amount of staking tokens (OSMO) bonded as collateral.
OSMO Inflation: 300m OSMO in year one. 200m in year two. 166m in year 3. More here.
Staking Reward Rate: Rewards from staking OSMO will vary depending on newly minted and distributed to stakers and the total amount of tokens that are staked at a given time. Another unique aspect of Osmosis is that only 25% of inflation rewards go to stakers (as of genesis). As OSMO is highly inflationary, the expected APR for staking OSMO can be expected to range somewhere between 300–1,000% for the first year (this depends a lot on how OSMO holders are engaging with their tokens). At the time of writing, with around 5.6% of the supply staking (6m of 102m available OSMO tokens), OSMO stakers are receiving a ~3.5% rewards on their OSMO tokens a day!
Learn more about the details of staking reward rates for chains built using Cosmos SDK here.
Chorus Commission: 7.5%
Withdrawal Delay: After withdrawing, your staked funds will only become accessible after the unbonding period (28 days) has passed.
Slashing: You can get slashed (loss funds) in case the validator you are delegated to commits an offense. Make sure to do due diligence to minimize this risk. Offences include double-signing (5% slashing penalty for delegators) and downtime (no slashing penalty, validator is ‘jailed’ and delegators miss out on staking rewards for minimum 2 hours).
Re-Staking: You need to withdraw rewards and re-stake them with some frequency if you want to make use of compounding returns.
Minimum delegation: There is no minimum delegation.
osmovaloper15urq2dtp9qce4fyc85m6upwm9xul3049wh9czc
Learn more: https://chorus.one/networks/osmosis
Wallets: Keplr
Block Explorers: Mintscan
Staking: Keplr — Once Keplr is installed, find ‘Chorus One’ on this page, click ‘manage’, put in the amount of $OSMO you would like to delegate to Chorus and then click ‘ delegate’.
Today we are pleased to announce our support for staking on Persistence, a network that is boldly attempting to create an interoperable marketplace for institutional asset transfer. Persistence is essentially re-creating accessibility for institutional liquidity and retail participation. The first product Persistence built was Comdex, a blockchain-based marketplace for trade finance and commodities. Using smart contracts, Persistence was able to standardise and bring immediate liquidity to the trading of commodities in Singapore. Since then, Persistence has built multiple products. One such product is a DeFi protocol known as pLend, where commodities companies can use their real-world assets (with terms in smart contracts) as collateral to borrow stablecoins supplied by crypto-native users. Other products Persistence has built include Audit.One, a validator that runs a node on multiple networks (including many that Chorus is also active on, e.g. Cosmos, Terra, NEAR, SKALE, and Celo) and pStake, a liquid staking protocol aiming to unlock liquidity of locked staking tokens in the Cosmos ecosystem.
Overall, Chorus and Persistence have a deep understanding of the intricacies of many networks and will be able to share that knowledge with each other to improve upon the security of Persistence’s own network. Not only that, Chorus will also be able to share its own liquid staking experience with Persistence to assist them building out liquid staking protocols on networks we both support.
We are yet to see exactly how real-world finance, DeFi, and staking will coalesce in the future. Running a node on Persistence allows us to contribute to a network that actively works on experimenting with the possibilities of this rich intersection within the Cosmos ecosystem. We are pleased to have the opportunity to secure a network that is building in areas that greatly align with Chorus.
Felix Lutsch, CCO of Chorus One
Chorus One is one of the most distinguished validators in the Proof-of-Stake ecosystem and has been at the forefront of innovation within this domain.
Meher (Co-Founder of Chorus One) has been a guiding force in my Crypto journey and now we are honoured to have Chorus One as a Validator on Persistence.
Persistence and Chorus One have a lot of synergies including on the soon to be launched liquid staking app — pStake Finance — by Persistence.
Tushar Aggarwal, CEO and Co-Founder of Persistence
Persistence.one is built using Cosmos SDK. Users can delegate their XPRT to Chorus One using a wallet, such as Keplr.
Validating Rights: The weight of validators is determined by the amount of staking tokens (XPRT) bonded as collateral.
XPRT Inflation: 35%
Reward Rate: Rewards from staking XPRT will vary depending on the inflation and total amount of tokens that are staked at a given time. Learn more about the details of staking reward rates for chains built using Cosmos SDK here.
Chorus Commission: 8%
Withdrawal Delay: After withdrawing, your staked funds will only become accessible after the unbonding period (usually 21 days) has passed.
Slashing: You can get slashed (loss funds) in case the validator you are delegated to commits an offense. Make sure to do due diligence to minimize this risk.
Re-Staking: You need to withdraw rewards and re-stake them with some frequency if you want to make use of compounding returns.
Persistence Staking FAQ: https://chorus.one/networks/persistence
Persistence Staking Guide: Persistence XPRT Staking Guide
Persistence Wallet: Keplr
Persistence Block Explorers: Persistence Block Explorer
Persistence Staking Reward Calculator: Staking Rewards
Lido, the largest liquid staking project on Eth2 and Terra, is looking to expand its offering to the high-performance blockchain Solana. Chorus One is building this service for Lido.
‘Lido for Solana’ is a Lido-DAO governed liquid staking protocol for the Solana blockchain. Anyone who stakes their SOL tokens with Lido will be issued an on-chain representation of SOL staking position with Lido validators, called stSOL. This will allow Solana token holders to get liquidity on their staked assets which can then be traded, or further utilized as collateral in DeFi products. We will work to integrate stSOL widely into the Solana DeFi ecosystem to enable stSOL users to make use of their staked assets in a variety of applications.
Lido for Solana gives you:
The Lido DAO is a Decentralized Autonomous Organization which governs and enables the development of liquid staking solutions for different blockchains.
The first liquid staking protocol solution was built for Ethereum — and now Lido is expanding to different blockchain networks. Chorus One recently proposed a plan to build “a liquid staking token that will accrue staking rewards and represent staking positions with Lido validators on Solana”. The stake deposited to the Lido contract on Solana will be distributed to these validators following a logic similar to the Lido (stETH) on Ethereum. Lido on Solana will have a fee mechanism similar to that on Ethereum which allows splitting fees between node operators and the Lido treasury (e.g. to be used for the insurance fund).
Lido’s decentralized organization brings together the industry’s top staking providers, decentralized finance projects, and investors. The Lido DAO eliminates dependence on a centralized authority, thereby removing the risk of a single point of failure. Distributed governance also fosters a stronger community!
Solana is an extremely fast, and censorship-resistant blockchain that has witnessed tremendous growth and adoption in the last year. Solana serves transactions at an order of magnitude higher rate when compared to base layer Ethereum. Additionally, there is a flourishing ecosystem emerging around Serum and other DeFi protocols such as Raydium, Oxygen, Pyth Network, and others that are being built on Solana. With over $14bn staked, Solana is now also in the Top 5 of Proof-of-Stake networks by staked value.
Liquid staking takes the utility of Solana a step further by:
Lido for Solana not only makes it very easy to stake but also provides further utility through stSOL. Let’s look at the process in slight detail. A SOL token holder connects their wallet to an interface that supports Lido (one will e.g. be hosted at https://stake.lido.fi) and deposits their tokens into the Lido program. They immediately receive stSOL tokens that represent a share of the total pool. Every user’s tokens are held in a pool controlled by the Lido program.
The Lido program collects the deposited SOL and releases the newly minted stSOL to the user. Beneath the layer, the Lido Program distributes this SOL uniformly across validators participating in the Lido Program. When these delegations accrue rewards on the allotted stake, the total SOL under pool management increases and this increases the value of stSOL tokens. The Lido DAO governs the Lido Program — and also controls the list of validators that are part of this program.
Let’s compare this to traditional Solana staking, where a user has to perform a number of steps:
Furthermore, in traditional staking, if the user wants to diversify her stake across validators she would have to create and manage stake accounts for each validator.
Staking SOL through Lido will come with a variety of benefits:
Interestingly, there is no waiting time for receiving stSOL tokens. When a user delegates their SOL tokens they do not need to perform or wait for the completion of any delegation or activation steps, as is the norm in traditional staking. The user can instantly exchange stSOL for SOL at any time in the open market.
In Lido for ETH, withdrawals from the Lido program are blocked until the ETH2 chain is live. In Lido for Solana, staggered withdrawals will be enabled. These direct withdrawals will take a couple of epochs to process, and will be beneficial for large withdrawals (e.g. because there will be no slippage from trading on the open market). However, for small withdrawals exchanging stSOL on a DEX (e.g. to SOL) will likely prove to be the go-to solution in order to exit a staking position with Lido for most of the users.
Reward distribution in ‘Lido for Solana’ is an interesting deviation from how rewards are distributed in Lido for Ethereum, which pegs ETH2 to stETH in a 1:1 ratio.
To understand how rewards work for ‘Lido for Solana’ let’s look at a hypothetical scenario. Let’s assume that the pool contains 2000 SOL and while we are at it let us also assume that a total of 1800 stSOL are held by the token holders. This puts an exchange rate of 0.9 stSOL per SOL.
If Alice deposits 1 SOL now she will get 0.9 stSOL in return. As rewards accrue SOL balance goes up, let’s say from 2000 to 2100. The new exchange rate becomes
Now if Alice goes and enquires about the value of her 0.9 stSOL, she finds it to be
Effectively, her SOL balance potentially went up by 5% from 1 SOL to 1.05 SOL. This approach is called the share-pool approach. Even though the numbers here are hypothetical they represent the concept of rewards accurately.
Note
The accrued rewards here are after a fee cut for Lido maintainers. To incentivize sustainable management of the Lido ecosystem, a portion of the rewards is split between the node operators and DAO treasury. The remaining larger chunk (on Ethereum, these amount to 90%) of rewards accrue to Lido users and get reflected in the increased value of stSOL as explained above.
Lido for Solana doesn’t follow the pegging approach, followed by ETH and stETH, as of now. However, this might be considered for revision when Solana launches native support for rebasing in SPL tokens.
The stSOLs that one gets can be used to reap secondary rewards through DeFi protocols. There will also be liquidity pools on AMM protocols and other DEXes where one will be able to immediately exchange stSOL for SOL. For the ETH<>stETH pair a popular AMM in terms of liquidity and volume is the Curve pool.
Withdrawals of SOL from the Lido program will be rolled out after the initial MVP that is expected later this summer. As mentioned above, instant withdrawals will be available in the open market. Once activated, withdrawal from the Lido pool will take a couple of epochs. This process is intentionally staggered to avoid bank-run scenarios.
As discussed in the rewards section a portion of the rewards goes to the Lido DAO treasury. The amount that goes to the Lido DAO treasury can be potentially used for different purposes
The Lido DAO is the deciding authority on the various parameters of the ecosystem. Things like fees, upgrade approvals, validator set, voting mechanisms, etc. are decided by the DAO. It is in the DAO’s charter to make the system run smoothly and it does so through the process of voting. To be a voter one must possess the governance token, LDO. The amount of LDO determines the weight of your vote.
Lido DAO’s governance is a key aspect of the ecosystem and holds the key to the success of Lido for Solana.
Chorus One proposed to build the liquid staking solution described here with support from the Lido DAO and the vote past with over 96m LDO in favor and 0 LDO against. Follow our Twitter handle and website to keep in touch with the latest updates.
We joined the Mina Protocol as a block producer coinciding with the protocol’s mainnet launch. MINA delegators stand to earn up to 24% APR on their tokens for helping to secure the network. In this post, we are detailing why we joined the Mina community and what you need to know about staking on Mina.
Mina is the first protocol to use recursive zero-knowledge proofs to track the entire state of a blockchain. Anyone in the world on any device can sync up and verify the chain at any point in time and act as a full computing node. Using zero-knowledge proofs to track states rather than a full ledger of transactions, Mina is able to keep their blockchain to a fixed size of ~22kb. As a result, Mina truly exemplifies a decentralised blockchain, as anyone in the world, even with limited access to resources, is able to participate and verify transactions. Not only is Mina well-decentralised, it is also privacy-oriented, as zero-knowledge proofs prove a statement to a verifier without revealing the exact specifics of that statement. The benefits of using zero-knowledge proofs are three-fold, ensuring scalability and decentralisation by keeping the blockchain small and accessible, as well as private, because those verifying transactions are unable to see specific details of a transaction.
The groundbreaking use of zero-knowledge proofs of zero-knowledge proofs (recursive) to track the entire state of a blockchain is a truly innovative approach that differs greatly from existing blockchains. We are particularly eager to see how Mina will integrate with web2 and believe that Mina can be the basis for interacting with websites that would traditionally require our personal data. In the future, we envision ourselves using Mina to prove information about ourselves to services that require it off-chain (such as banks) without giving away the specific details of what we are proving. An immediate use-case building on Mina is Teller, a protocol advancing unsecured lending in DeFi. In Teller, a user can prove their credit score is over a limit without revealing the exact number of their score over that limit thanks to zero-knowledge proof technology. We are eager to see how permissionless oracles in Mina will be incorporated by Snapps in the future too.
Mina is a lightweight, succinct blockchain. Each block contains state ‘proofs’, rather than the entire state. The size of Mina’s blockchain is always fixed ~22kb, allowing anyone on any device to quickly sync and verify the chain at any point in time. Mina is a Proof-of-Stake blockchain that uses Ouroboros Samasika for consensus, a provably secure consensus mechanism that chooses block producers ahead of time.
MINA token holders can delegate their tokens to validators such as Chorus One to earn staking rewards for helping to secure Mina and the snark powered decentralised apps (Snapps) it hosts. We are currently the sixth largest validator by assets staked on Mina with almost 15m MINA tokens staked. If you are interested in staking, you are able to stake with us through our custodian partner Finoa, or through non-custodial wallets listed further below. The following factors need to be taken into account when considering to stake on the Mina Protocol:
Epochs: Mina uses epochs to account for time. There are 7,140 slots per epoch and each slot is 3 minutes long (so an epoch lasts ~14–15 days).
Payout: Mina does not automatically payout rewards to delegators, Chorus will manually pay out rewards to delegators. Our payout schedule will initially be once per epoch shortly after epochs rolled over (i.e. every two weeks). We might update that to a more frequent schedule as we improve our payout mechanism. Payouts for the initial epoch already took place.
Validating rights: The stake distribution that is sampled when determining the VRF threshold is contained on another special ledger called the “staking ledger” (main ledger is called “staged ledger”). Using two separate ledgers means that validators are only able to see when they have the opportunity to publish a block 2 epochs into the future.
Reward rate: ~12% APR, for token holders with only liquid tokens this will be double (i.e. 24% APR at the moment).
Slashing: There is no slashing in Mina.
Latency period: There is a latency period of around a month before a new stake delegation comes into effect and starts to earn rewards (since the staking ledger is always decided 2 epochs in advance).
Minimum delegation: There is no minimum delegation.
Supercharged rewards: Mina token holders that do not have locked tokens receive higher rewards. At Chorus One, we take this into account for our reward payouts meaning delegators without vesting accounts will receive higher staking rewards!
Address: B62qmFf6UZn2sg3j8bYLGmMinzS2FHX6hDM71nFxAfMhvh4hnGBtkBD
Commission Rate:
10%
Payout Frequency:
Every epoch (i.e. every two weeks)
Learn more about staking Mina with us on our website.
Token Sale (April 13–16, 2021):
Coinlist
Staking Guides:
Delegating Mina using Clorio wallet
Delegating Mina using Finoa’s platform (Figment guide)
Delegating Mina using Clorio & Ledger
Delegating Mina using Ledger Nano S
Validator Dashboards:
Mina Validator Dashboard
Block Explorers:
Mina Explorer
Hubble
Mina Fees:
Mina Protocol Gas Station
On March 17 2021, Anchor protocol went live.
The release of Anchor protocol unleashed a new era for Decentralised Finance (DeFi) on Terra blockchain. Anchor protocol targets 20% APY for depositors of UST (TerraUSD) by transferring staking rewards of liquid LUNA (bLuna) from borrowers to depositors using a liquidation mechanism that converts bLuna rewards into UST. The result of this, is a seamless user experience that non-native crypto users can easily navigate. Anchor protocol solves APR volatility demonstrated in competing DeFi lending protocols by ignoring a singular asset approach, where the amount of one asset that is able to be borrowed is directly related to the amount of an asset available in a pool for it (assets supplied by depositors). Before Anchor, depositors were exposed to high amounts of liquidity risk. If borrower demand for an asset exceeded what was being supplied by depositors, the asset might be being ‘utilised’ 100%, meaning there are no extra funds available to be borrowed and the full amount of someone’s deposit is being used, opening up the possibility of a bank run.
Anchor has instead chosen to focus on transferring borrower yield to depositors. This minimises liquidity risk as the principal amount that has been deposited by a user is always protected. The yield (APR) that a depositor can achieve in Anchor relies on borrower behaviour.
Liquid staking is the mechanism behind Anchor APY and why we at Chorus are so excited about the protocol. Before the release of Anchor, staked LUNA was not able to be utilised as collateral in DeFi protocols on Terra blockchain and had an unbonding period of 3 weeks. Concurrently with the release of Anchor, Lido DAO announced that they would be providing liquid derivatives of staked LUNA (known as bLuna) that would be used in the protocol. Chorus One is a proud partner of Lido DAO and we are one of 8 validators offering the service to users on Anchor to mint bLuna using LUNA. The newly minted bLuna allows users to earn rewards on their LUNA that is being staked by a white-listed validator whilst also gives the user the opportunity to transfer ownership of the bLuna or use it as collateral — liquid staking at its finest! Understanding the mechanism of bLuna is the key to understanding how depositors are able to earn 20% APY in Anchor.
Borrowers in Anchor use their liquid staking derivative (bLuna) to lock up as collateral in order to borrow TerraUSD (UST). Because the bLuna earns staking rewards and is being used as collateral by borrowers, Anchor protocol is able to liquidate the collateral’s rewards being earned on bLuna by borrowers into UST for depositors. Essentially, Anchor protocol passes on staking derivative cash-flows from borrowers, liquidates the cash-flows into UST and transfers the UST cash-flows onto depositors, to earn them the target yield (20% APY as of time of writing).
If you’re excited by all of this and want to get involved — read on to learn about how you can mint your first liquid staking derivative (bLuna) through Lido, use your newly minted bLuna as collateral to borrow TerraUSD ($UST), earn Anchor’s native governance tokens ($ANC) whilst your bLuna is ‘locked up’ as collateral during the loan and then earn a further stable yield on your newly borrowed $UST by depositing it back into the protocol. This is known as yield farming in DeFi.
Step 1
Make sure you have abided by the prerequisites and you have LUNA in your Terra Station wallet.
Step 2
Navigate to the Anchor webpage and click ‘Web-app’ at the top right
Step 3
Once you have entered into the web-app, you will be shown the ‘earn screen’. This screen shows the amount of interest you can earn on your UST deposit in the protocol, how much UST you have deposited from your wallet so far and your transaction history on Anchor. Right now, we only hold LUNA and not liquid Luna (bLuna). We need to bond our LUNA from the exchange to mint bLuna (a derivative that unlocks liquidity of our tokens earning staking rewards and can be transferred at any time) in order to use our LUNA as collateral to borrow. Navigate to the ‘bond’ tab and click on the tab.
Step 4
Once you have clicked on the bond tab, you will be able to choose the amount of LUNA that you would like to bond. To bond your LUNA, click ‘I want to bond’ field and enter in the number of LUNA you would like to lock-up to mint bLuna (derivative of your LUNA). When you have entered the amount of LUNA in the ‘I want to bond’ field, you will see the amount of bLuna you will receive in return. Once you are happy with the amount of LUNA you want to bond as bLuna, you can choose your validator. bLuna is minted by Lido DAO and Chorus is a proud partner of Lido. Lido DAO has the most trusted validators in the world issuing liquid staking derivatives. When you bond your LUNA as bLuna, you will have the option to choose 1 of 8 (currently) world-class validators, which will stake and earn your LUNA staking rewards whilst you get given a bLuna derivative (claim to your stake with the validator). Chorus One is available as an option to stake your LUNA. When choosing a validator, always be aware of the risks. When you have selected the amount of bLuna you want to mint, the price for each LUNA <> bLuna will be displayed — it should be a 1:1 swap and the tx fee will need to be paid for the swap in UST. When you are happy with the amount of bLuna you would like to mint and you have selected a validator to stake your assets to earn rewards, click ‘mint’.
Step 5
You will be taken to your terra station wallet to sign the transaction. Enter the password you created when you set-up the wallet.
Step 6
Once you have submitted your transaction, wait ~6 seconds (time it takes for a new block to be created on Terra blockchain).
Step 7
Once a new block has been created, you will receive a successful transaction message. You will be able to see the amount you bonded into a liquid staking derivative (bLuna), exchange rate for it (should be 1), your transaction hash and the transaction fee you paid to convert your LUNA into bLuna by bonding LUNA with a validator. If you would like, you are able to view your transaction on Terra explorer. Click on the ‘Tx Hash’.
Step 8
All details of your conversion of LUNA to bLuna is transparent on Terra blockchain and you can view it on Terra Finder — Terra’s explorer.
Step 9
Great! You have now minted bLuna and you are now able to borrow on Anchor protocol (using bLuna as collateral for your loan). Navigate back to the Anchor web-app where you were before and click ‘OK’’.
Step 10
You are now back in the bond tab where you started, navigate to the ‘borrow’ tab and click on the ‘borrow’ button.
Step 11
Now you are in the borrow tab, you are ready to provide the bLuna you just minted as collateral to obtain a loan in UST from Anchor Protocol (and earn ANC rewards for doing so, the governance token of Anchor). On this page you can see the amount of value you have borrowed (none so far), value of collateral you have provided (again nothing yet) and the ‘net APR’ — this is the annual percentage rate of what you earn for borrowing on Anchor — that’s right, you get paid to borrow! When borrowing on Anchor, you earn ANC rewards, the amount of ANC rewards you earn is based on the amount of UST you borrow, using your bLuna as collateral. But first, we need to provide collateral in order to borrow. Click on the ‘provide’ button.
Step 12
Put in the ‘deposit amount’ — the amount of bLuna that you would like to use as collateral. In this example, we will use 10 bLuna as collateral and the system will tell us the maximum amount of UST we can borrow against our Luna as collateral. You are not able to borrow more than 50% of your bLuna amount (denoted in $USD). For example, if you bond 10 bLuna and the value is $20 for each LUNA, your $USD amount of LUNA is $200 (10 * $20). You can only borrow up to $100 USD with your bLuna as collateral in this instance, meaning you can only take a loan out of maximum $100 UST in Anchor. You can see the new borrow limit automated (up to this 50% threshold) that you can take out from Anchor using your bLuna as collateral and the fee for your borrowing transaction. When you are happy with the amount of bLuna you would like to use as collateral, click the ‘proceed’ button.
Step 13
Sign the transaction. The same method as Step 6.
Step 14
Wait for your receipt (~6 seconds to wait for a new block to be created in Terra).
Step 15
Great success! The transaction should have completed. You can see the amount you have collaterised, your new loan-to-value (amount of value you can receive from your loan, maximum 50% in USD of the bLuna you have used as collateral — more on this later) and can see your transaction hash and fee too. You can either view your transaction hash (like in step 8) or you can click ‘OK’.
Step 16
Now you are back in the borrow tab and you have provided bLuna as collateral, which you have previously minted. You are now able to borrow UST on Anchor! You can see the value of your bLuna collateral (denoted in USD), net APR (% of ANC you earn for using your bLuna as collateral), borrowed value (nothing yet) and the type of collateral you have provided — LUNA. In the future, Anchor aims to allow other liquid staking derivatives to be used as collateral — for now though, bLuna is the only available option. You are now ready to borrow — click the ‘borrow’ button in the top right corner of the page.
Step 17
You will now be given options about how much UST you would like to borrow with your bLuna as collateral. The first field is a ‘borrowed amount’ field. This field is automated depending on the green slider below it that you can drag to the left and right of the screen. This slider is the ‘Loan-To-Value’. As explained in step 16, this is the amount of a loan you can take out compared to the value you have put in the system as collateral (bLuna). It is impossible to take more than 50% of a loan out with the value of your bLuna (in USD) so on the right hand side it has a max LTV of 50%. The system recommends a 35% safe LTV. We would recommend much safer than this, perhaps somewhere around the 20% mark to be extra safe. If your loan to value is 50%, you have 10 bLuna valued at $20 — your value is $200. You are able to take out a loan of maximum $100 UST with this. However, if the value of the LUNA drops e.g. to $9 (cryptocurrencies are volatile), your collateral will be liquidated by the protocol to pay your debt as your LTV is 55%. This is because the value of your collateral is now $180, you have a loan of $100, the system does not accept this (too risky) and instead sells your collateral (bLuna) to recover the loan it issued you of $100. You are then left with whatever is left of your collateral that was not sold off by the system to recover its debt. However, if your LTV starts at 25%, you will take out $50 of UST in a loan and have value at $200 USD of bLuna. If the price of LUNA falls to $9 as above (collateral value now $180 USD), your LTV is still much lower than the required 50% threshold (it would be 27%) and here you would be much less susceptible to market risk of LUNA and costs of being liquidated. For the above reasons, we recommend exercising caution and hedging risk by borrowing a very small amount of UST to your bLuna collateral. Click the ‘proceed’ button when you are satisfied with your LTV.
Step 18
Sign the transaction by entering your password, the same method as Step 6, then click Submit.
Step 19
Wait for your receipt.
Step 20
Your transaction is complete! You can view your new LTV, outstanding loan ($UST), transaction hash and transaction fee you paid for your loan. Click ‘OK’ to exit out of the confirmation box.
Step 21
Nice one! You have successfully minted bLuna and then used your bLuna as collateral to take out a loan on Anchor! You can see all the details on the borrow page. You can also see your ‘borrow limit’ — this is related to your LTV. The borrow limit in this example is at 40% because we chose a low LTV (~20%). The system is telling us that we can borrow more if we would like to, however we recommend not going anywhere near your borrow limit.
Step 22
Navigate to earn and click the ‘earn’ tab. It’s time to start earning a yield on the $UST you have borrowed!
Step 23
In the ‘earn’ tab, click the ‘deposit’ button.
Step 24
Enter in the amount of $UST you would like to earn a yield on. This is like a savings account. If you only have $UST that you have borrowed from Anchor using bLuna as collateral, you can enter in the amount you borrowed. In this example, we borrowed ~$37 UST, so we will deposit our borrowed amount into the protocol to earn a yield. Click the ‘proceed’ button to deposit your $UST.
Step 25
Enter in password to sign the transaction to officially deposit your $UST into Anchor — like in Step 6.
Step 26
Congratulations! You have successfully minted $bLuna using $LUNA (choosing Chorus One as a validator of course), used your $bLuna as collateral to borrow $UST (earning yourself $ANC, Anchor protocol’s governance token) and then deposited your borrowed $UST into a money market protocol and received $aUST (a token that is a claim on your underlying $UST), which earns you a stable yield above >20% on your $UST — not bad compared to a traditional savings account! Click the ‘OK’ button to proceed.
Step 27
You will be taken back to the ‘earn’ tab, which also shows you the APY currently (it is variable and can fluctuate day-to-day — but it should always remain close to the target rate of 20%). Another cool feature on the ‘earn’ page is the amount of interest you can expect to earn in 1-year with your $UST deposit. In this example, you can see our deposit of ~$37 and we will earn ~$8 on our deposit over the course of a year. You can always visit https://app.anchorprotocol.com/earn and look at the total deposit tab. Your total amount should increase every block — you receive a yield on your savings every ~6 seconds (block time).
Step 1
If you would like to repay the loan, withdraw your deposit from Anchor’s savings protocol. You will receive $UST back in return for return $aUST.
Step 2
Put in the amount you would like to withdraw, then click the ‘proceed’ button.
Step 3
Sign the transaction on Terra station, as in Step 6 of the borrowing tutorial.
Step 4
Wait for transaction to process
Step 5
Withdraw complete! You have received the $UST back that you initially loaned using bLuna as collateral. You will have returned your aTokens back to Anchor protocol (your original claim to your underlying $UST tokens). Click OK to return back to the webpage.
Step 6
Navigate to the ‘borrow’ tab and click the ‘borrow’ button.
Step 7
Click the ‘repay’ button.
Step 8
Use the toggle to bring your LTV to 0%. This means that you have no loan with your value (collateral) — because you are repaying your debt! Click proceed when you have dragged your LTV to 0 and you have officially repaid your loan and you have returned all $UST that you borrowed.
Step 9
Sign your transaction in your Terra station wallet.
Step 10
Wait for your receipt (should take ~6 seconds).
Step 11
Transaction complete! You have repaid your debt and have no outstanding loan! Click OK to finish.
This is the end of the tutorial! If you would like, you are also able to withdraw your bLuna as collateral from Anchor in the ‘borrow’ tab, where the ‘Collateral List’ is.
Congratulations! You have successfully used your $LUNA to mint $bLuna (an instantly transferable and usable liquid staking derivative of $LUNA), used that $bLuna to take out a $UST (TerraUSD) loan in Anchor, received $ANC governance tokens as reward for supplying collateral to the protocol for the loan (>100% $ANC APR )and deposited your minted $UST into the savings protocol to earn a 20% $UST APR on your $UST deposit.
Yield farming ain’t much, but it’s honest work.
Our content is intended to be used and must be used for educational purposes only. It is not intended as legal, financial or investment advice and should not be construed or relied on as such. The information is general in nature and has not taken into account your personal financial position or objectives. Before making any commitment of financial nature you should seek advice from a qualified and registered financial or investment adviser. Chorus One does not recommend that any cryptocurrency should be bought, sold, or held by you. Any reference to an opportunities past or potential performance is not, and should not be construed as, a recommendation or as a guarantee of any specific outcome or profit. Always remember to do your own research.
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Chorus One is offering staking services and building protocols and tools to advance the Proof-of-Stake ecosystem.
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