Ethereum layer 2 Starknet is laying the groundwork to choose Bitcoin and Ethereum to unify the 2 largest blockchains on a single layer.
The Starknet Basis said in its March 11 Bitcoin roadmap that it’s aiming for Starknet to grow to be Bitcoin’s execution layer, scaling it from 13 transactions per second to 1000's, decreasing blocks and fuel charges, and creating a greater consumer expertise.
“Most Bitcoin as we speak sits static in wallets and exchanges, constrained by the constraints of the community’s authentic design: a scarcity of scalability and an incapacity to natively help functions past easy shopping for, promoting, and transferring,” the inspiration mentioned.
It added that whereas some traders view Bitcoin as “digital gold,” it believes “there's a demand for using Bitcoin for functions past that.”
Supply: Starknet
Beforehand, StarkWare CEO Eli Ben Sasson, the corporate behind the STARK proof that contributes to the event of Starknet, mentioned OP_CAT, a Satoshi-era opcode for unlocking programmability on Bitcoin that was disabled over safety considerations, would allow Starknet to settle on the Bitcoin blockchain.
If profitable, Starknet mentioned the transfer would permit builders to construct functions on the Bitcoin community by way of good contracts and allow functions equivalent to staking, borrowing, lending, leveraged buying and selling, and yield farming.
As a part of the announcement, StarkWare mentioned it has joined the rising variety of companies in making a Bitcoin (BTC) reserve, holding a growing portion of its treasury in crypto.
Supply: Ameen Soleimani
Starknet can even workforce up with Bitcoin Web3 wallet Xverse, whose founder and CEO Ken Liao mentioned the combination, slated for the second quarter of 2025, will obtain Bitcoin’s “DeFi take-off second.”
Xverse said wallets must be extra than simply storage options; and permit quick access to Bitcoin’s rising utility. Liao mentioned in a press release that the endgame is trustless DeFi on Bitcoin.
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“In as we speak’s atmosphere, there's a temptation for pockets groups to say, ‘yeah, let’s simply concentrate on making it simpler for individuals to make use of Bitcoin as a retailer of worth,’” Liao mentioned.
“However the long-term way forward for Bitcoin additionally contains utility, and that’s why layer 2 options should attain the general public through the wallets they really use,” he added.
In the meantime, in a March 11 X area discussing Starknet’s plan, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said a correct Bitcoin L2 that may fulfill the wanted safety properties would “make crypto funds nice once more, and all these use circumstances can work.”
Starknet on Bitcoin and Ethereum https://t.co/tCyQDHY7Yr
— StarkWare 🐺🐱 (@StarkWareLtd) March 11, 2025
Buterin mentioned there's a “lot of worth” in enabling the trustless circulation of belongings between the Bitcoin and Ethereum ecosystems, equivalent to simpler paths for decentralized alternate.
“In case you return to the white paper, Bitcoin was meant to be a peer-to-peer digital money system, and clearly, layer 1 just isn't practically scalable sufficient for that,” Buterin mentioned.
“I believe we’ve additionally seen a number of the limits of the Lightning Community and that type of method.“
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