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Bitcoin Startup Babylon Raises $70 Million to Bring BTC Staking to Ethereum and Solana

Babylon, a startup working to enable native Bitcoin staking on chains like Ethereum and Solana, just raised $70 million towards that goal.

A crypto startup seeking to use Bitcoin for native staking on other blockchain networks has secured $70 million in fresh funding to fuel its ambitious goals.

Babylon, which is aiming to do something never accomplished before, secured the cash from lead investor Paradigm, a prominent crypto venture capital firm. Other contributions came from Bullish Capital and Polychain Capital. 

The startup wants to use Bitcoin, the biggest cryptocurrency by market cap, as a resource for staking. Previously, the firm told Decrypt that it’s building infrastructure to use Bitcoin staking to validate nodes on networks such as Ethereum and Solana.

“This funding will accelerate our mission to make Bitcoin the security backbone of proof-of-stake systems,” Babylon founder David Tse said in a statement. “Our team is dedicated to advancing the utility of Bitcoin beyond its traditional roles and enhancing the security of the entire blockchain ecosystem.”

Currently, Bitcoin runs on a very different system to staking protocols because it uses a system called proof-of-work.

Proof-of-work requires lots of computing power—in the form of miners—to process transactions. It’s an expensive and energy intensive process.

But with proof-of-stake, anyone can participate by “locking up” their assets to power a crypto network. Staking networks include the likes of Ethereum, Solana, and Cardano. 

Babylon wants those holding Bitcoin to be able to earn a yield by pledging their coins to staking networks. It’s a bold challenge, but the startup—led by a Stanford professor and a former Dolby engineer—says it has found a way. Last year, it raised $18 million from investors. 

If it does achieve what it wants, those sitting on satoshis (aka the smallest denomination of Bitcoin) will soon be able to earn yield.

Acest tip de monedă este „printre cele mai riscante dintre criptomonede

Prețul Dogecoin, un token digital popular, marcat după meme-ul „doge” shiba inu, a crescut cu aproximativ 14% în ultima lună, potrivit CoinMarketCap. Iar prețul lui Pepe, o monedă meme numită după meme-ul „Pepe the frog”, a crescut cu peste 100% din 29 aprilie, conform CoinMarketCap.
Dar înainte de a vă gândi să investiți în criptomonede, este important să înțelegeți diferența dintre monedele meme, altcoins și bitcoin.

Bitcoin

Bitcoin este criptomoneda originală și cea mai mare după capitalizarea pieței, cu peste 1,3 trilioane de dolari, potrivit CoinMarketCap. A fost creat de Satoshi Nakamoto, o persoană sau un grup de oameni a căror identitate rămâne un mister. Nakamoto a imaginat bitcoin ca o versiune alternativă a numerarului virtual care nu se va baza pe o instituție guvernamentală sau financiară, cum ar fi o bancă, pentru a funcționa și a facilita plățile.

Altcoins

Altcoins, cunoscut și ca monede alternative, se referă la orice criptomonedă care nu este bitcoin. Deși unele dintre aceste jetoane digitale pot funcționa similar cu bitcoin, ele sunt construite pe diferite rețele blockchain.

Există mii de altcoins, care sunt de obicei create cu un scop specific în minte. Luați stablecoins, de exemplu. Un stablecoin este un tip de altcoin care își fixează valoarea cu un alt activ, cum ar fi aurul sau dolarul american, cu scopul de a-și stabiliza prețul.

Monede meme

Sub umbrela altcoins-urilor se află monede meme. Aceste jetoane virtuale sunt de obicei create pentru distracție și poartă numele după meme-uri de pe internet sau referințe la cultura pop. Și, deși fiecare monedă meme este un altcoin, fiecare altcoin nu este neapărat o monedă meme.

Deși toate criptomonedele prezintă riscuri, monedele meme pot fi deosebit de perfide pentru comercianți, spune Royal.

„Monedele meme sunt printre cele mai riscante dintre criptomonede, deoarece par să apară de nicăieri, iar informațiile despre ele pot fi rare”, spune el. „Se așteaptă ca aceștia să crească și să scadă pe măsură ce sentimentul public se schimbă într-un loc și altul. Monedele meme pot capta fantezia publicului astăzi și pot dispărea mâine.”

$BTC $SOL #PayPal #Solana⁩ #solananews
PayPal USD Stablecoin Now Available on Solana Blockchain, Providing Faster, Cheaper Transactions for Consumers

Crypto.com, Phantom and Paxos are first to provide onramps to use PayPal USD (PYUSD) on Solana blockchain

SAN JOSE, Calif., May 29, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- At Consensus 2024, PayPal Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: PYPL) announced that PayPal USD (PYUSD) is now available on the Solana blockchain, making PayPal's stablecoin faster and cheaper to use. The availability of PYUSD on Solana provides users1 with the choice of multiple blockchains allowing for increased flexibility and control.

The Solana blockchain is known for processing massive amounts of transactions at high speeds with extremely low costs, providing significant benefits for commerce use cases. As the most used blockchain for stablecoin transfers, according to data from blockchain analytics platform Artemis, Solana has emerged as the leading blockchain to run tokenized transactions and is ideal for PYUSD as it continues to be used for payment use cases.

"For more than 25 years, PayPal has been at the forefront of digital commerce, revolutionizing commerce by providing a trusted experience between consumers and merchants around the world. PayPal USD was created with the intent to revolutionize commerce again by providing a fast, easy, and inexpensive payment method for the next evolution of the digital economy," said Jose Fernandez da Ponte, Senior Vice President of the Blockchain, Cryptocurrency, and Digital Currency Group, PayPal. "Making PYUSD available on the Solana blockchain furthers our goal of enabling a digital currency with a stable value designed for commerce and payments."

"The Solana network's speed and scalability make it the ideal blockchain for new payment solutions that are accessible, cost-effective, and instantaneous," said Sheraz Shere, GM of Payments at the Solana Foundation. "Continued adoption from industry participants like PayPal helps realize the next generation of fintech innovation."