Compound Releases “Gateway” Prototype For Cross-Chain Interest Rates

Compound Finance is ready with the prototype of its new distributed ledger for cross-chain interest rate markets, dubbed “Gateway”. The company announced their plans back in December 2020, when Compound published the Compound Chain whitepaper.

“Compound Chain is a tool that could bring more assets into the protocol from a variety of ledgers e.g. Polkadot, Solana, Optimism PBC, Quorum, Celo, etc. It’s designed to complement the Ethereum contracts, be controlled by COMP governance, and extend DeFi network effects,” Compound CEO Robert Leshner stated when announcing the new product.

According to Compound Chain’s whitepaper, the new blockchain would operate on a standalone principle, utilizing a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus algorithm, which let many specialists believe Compound Chain would be a direct Ethereum rival.

The new chain would also use a native token, dubbed CASH, which would serve as a staking medium as well as for standardizing value across assets.

The real power of the “Gateway” prototype blockchain, however, is the cross-chain interoperability, which ensures assets can be easily exchanged, despite being on separate blockchains.

“We chose Substrate so that we could focus on building application code, instead of inventing consensus algorithms; it’s a modern framework built on a modern language, Rust,” Leshner added.

Meanwhile, a new feature inside Gateway would allow network validators to be nominated by COMP token holders. Validators, in turn, will earn a part of all interest rates, generated on the platform, apart from transaction fees.

“Gateway will evolve into the backbone of a global interest rate market, capable of supporting any asset — including the wave of currencies, assets, and tokens yet to be created.”, claims Compound`s team.

Currently, Gateway is operating as a testnet connected to Ethereum’s Ropsten testnet. A specified mainnet launch date is still not announced as the network must undergo a series of audits prior to the launch.

The news about the prototype being live gave a breath of fresh air for Compound’s COMP token, which exploded 18% up in just 24 hours. However, with a price point of $513.60, COMP is still behind its all-time high of $535, reached on February 13.

In terms of total value locked (TVL), however, Compound is regaining momentum after its February 22 high of $5.5 billion, as currently, the protocol managed to lock a little over $5 billion.