Stride Briefing: 10th Edition
Jul 27, 2023
· 3 min read
The Stride Briefing is the easiest way to keep abreast of all things Stride! On a bi-weekly basis, the Briefing will concisely inform you of: recent Stride events, future Stride events, and provide current stats on Stride’s various Osmosis liquidity pools. The Stride Briefing will also serve to get newcomers up to speed.
Briefing #10, let’s go!
What is Stride?
Stride is a Cosmos-wide liquid staking provider. Using Stride’s liquid staking, you can earn staking rewards from Cosmos proof-of-stake tokens without having to stake them. Since your tokens remain liquid, you can deploy them in DeFi. This means you no longer have to choose between staking yield and DeFi yield. Thanks to Stride, you can have both at once.
Tokens supported: ATOM, OSMO, JUNO, STARS, LUNA, EVMOS, INJ, UMEE, CMDX, IBCX
Have questions? Check out Stride’s thorough FAQ, or join the Stride Discord.
Notable Recent Happenings
Two weeks ago, Stride launched its refreshed brand, including a new logo. This refresh was a celebration of the successful year Stride has had since launching Testnet in July 2022. The goal of the brand refresh is to maintain Stride’s core identity while also reflecting and consolidating Stride’s place in the Cosmos. You can learn more here.
On July 19th, Stride transitioned to Interchain Security and joined the ATOM Economic Zone. This landmark event makes Stride the second chain to be secured by $2.3 billion of staked ATOM and the first chain to transition from being a live sovereign chain to an ICS chain. Although block production has been handed over from Stride’s validator set to the Cosmos Hub’s validator set, users will still be able to stake STRD to get staking rewards, and present stakers will remain unaffected. You can find a comprehensive breakdown of Stride’s transition to ICS and what it means here.
Upcoming Things
Stride announced a new Validator Selection Process. Over the coming months, Stride governance will select a set of validators on the Cosmos Hub and Osmosis respectively to delegate the ATOM and OSMO liquid staked through Stride. The process involves an advisory council, approved by the relevant host chain, selecting a set of host zone validators, which will in turn be approved by Stride governance. You can learn more about the process by reading this signaling proposal.
Applications Open for Validator Advisory Council
As part of the validator selection process, Stride is accepting applications from individuals who wish to be considered for the Validator Advisory Councils for the Cosmos Hub and Osmosis. The Validator Advisory Council will be approved by governance on the relevant host zone. Once approved, the Council will be responsible for selecting the host zone validator sets to which the ATOM and OSMO liquid staked on Stride will be delegated. All community members are encouraged to apply and in doing so continue contributing to both the Stride Ecosystem and the Hub and Osmosis Ecosystems. You can apply for the Cosmos Hub council here, and for the Osmosis Council here.
Cosmos Hub adding Liquid Staking Module
The upcoming Cosmos Hub v12 upgrade will include the Liquid Staking Module (LSM), which proposes a safe path to increase capital efficiency on the Cosmos Hub. LSM has three main features that contribute to the security and capital efficiency of the Hub. The first feature creates a cap that prevents liquid staking providers from holding more than 25% of staked ATOM. This measure increases the security of the chain, as it prevents Liquid Staking providers from controlling more than the 33% threshold required to attack the chain. The second feature requires validators who wish to receive liquid staking delegations to self-bond ATOM, in order to disincentivize malicious action. Thirdly, and most importantly, LSM allows stakers to convert staked ATOM to liquid-staked ATOM instantly, without having to unbond or forfeit staking rewards. Once implemented, users who currently have staked ATOM will be able to convert this to stATOM directly on the Stride app. To learn more about LSM, you can read the forum post here.
Stride Liquidity Pool Incentives Guidance
Stride is nearing the end of a 30 Day Liquidity Incentives Program which began on July 7th. Here is what the breakdown of stToken incentives currently look like:
Once this program ends on August 4th, Stride will launch a new 30 day liquidity incentive program. While you can find detailed information in the relevant blog post, here is a summary of the liquidity incentives as per the 30 day incentive program beginning August 5th:
That's all for now! Follow Stride on Twitter for real-time updates.
