Persistence: Innovation in Liquid Staking and Re-staking in the Cosmos Ecosystem

Persistence is one of the early application chains in the Cosmos ecosystem to enable IBC, CosmWasm, and liquid staking module (LSM). By deeply cultivating products related to POS and liquid staking, it has built a complete liquid staking and re-staking architecture for the Cosmos ecosystem.

On December 5, 2023, the Cosmos community voted to approve a proposal to allocate 600,000 ATOM for the growth of liquid staking for pSTAKE. pSTAKE will share 15% of its liquid staking revenue with Cosmos Hub.

Persistence Ecosystem Overview

According to official data, the total locked value of the Persistence ecosystem is ( TVL ), reaching 14.78 million USD, with an IBC trading volume of 15 million USD in the last 30 days and an average transaction cost of less than 0.005 USD.

Data shows that Persistence has established 121 channels with 44 other regions in the Interchain network, highlighting its position as a highly interconnected node.

Currently, 74.7% of the network tokens ($XPRT) are in a stake state, a high staking rate reflects the security and participation of the network. The annualized return rate for staking is approximately 16.7%.

The infrastructure of Persistence consists of 6 nodes and 100 validators, working together to maintain the decentralization and security of the network.

In the past 24 hours, the IBC trading volume of Persistence reached $260,800, with a total of 4,955 transactions, of which 616 were IBC transactions. There were 932 active addresses and 86 IBC active addresses. It is worth noting that the IBC capital inflow has consistently exceeded the outflow, indicating that more and more value is flowing into Persistence and participating in stake.

Technical Support

Persistence supports the CosmWasm framework, enabling developers to write secure and interoperable smart contracts in Rust. DApps developed on the CosmWasm framework can run across chains through IBC, achieving cross-chain interoperability for applications and providing convenient, secure, and efficient technical support for liquid staking.

Persistence connects to 54 Cosmos application chains through IBC for trustless communication, transferring, staking, and re-staking tokens, laying the ecological foundation for staking and re-staking in the Cosmos ecosystem.

Implement ICA Liquid Staking using Interchain Accounts (ICA). Interchain Accounts allow an account on one chain to perform operations on another chain, enhancing the efficiency and flexibility of staking and re-staking.

liquid staking

Cosmos ecosystem stake and network security

In the Cosmos ecosystem, liquid staking includes two roles - validators and delegators.

The staker (, that is the delegator ), can choose the validator node to delegate to when staking. Validators run hardware and blockchain applications based on the Cosmos SDK to reach consensus with other validators, proposing and validating new blocks on the chain.

If a validator exhibits negative behavior, the delegators of the validator node will face corresponding penalties. For example, if the validator unexpectedly or maliciously goes offline, the delegator's stake will be reduced by 0.1%. If the validator engages in extremely malicious behavior, such as double signing violations, the stake will be reduced by 5%.

It can be seen that the essence of liquid staking in the Cosmos ecosystem is to prevent malicious behavior through economic incentives and potential penalties. Validators and delegators share the responsibility of maintaining network efficiency and security while obtaining certain token rewards.

pSTAKE stake

pSTAKE provides a streamlined staking process for the Cosmos ecosystem. Users only need to select the token to stake and the chain they are on to proceed with staking. Once staking is completed, the pSTAKE protocol distributes the corresponding staking rights tokens to the wallet. For example, staking ATOM results in receiving stkATOM.

Automatic Compound Interest

Taking stkATOM as an example, the user's daily staking yield is in ATOM, which will automatically enter the stake to continue generating returns. Once the yield is staked, the amount of staked ATOM corresponding to each stkATOM increases, allowing the user to receive more ATOM when they unstake. Therefore, the user's staking yield is reflected as an increase in the ratio of stkATOM to ATOM.

Unstake

When users cancel their stake, they need to wait for 21 to 25 days; they can also pay a fee of 1% to instantly withdraw their stake. When users retrieve their stake, the corresponding stk assets are destroyed.

Notes

pSTAKE currently supports the following five tokens: ATOM on Cosmos Hub, OSMO on the Osmosis chain, DYDX on the dYdX chain, STARS on Stargaze, and HUAHUA on Chihuahua, as well as those minted on the Persistence chain.

When users choose to stake native chain tokens, pSTAKE staking goes through two steps: transferring assets across chains to the Persistence chain via IBC, and then invoking the liquid staking module of the Persistence chain to stake the assets.

Therefore, on pSTAKE, regardless of which chain's assets are staked, a certain amount of the base token of the Persistence chain $XPRT needs to be held as GAS. However, the GAS fees on the Persistence chain are very low.

stake derivatives

Persistence and the Cosmos ecosystem have launched more stk asset derivatives. For example, in DEX products, you can directly exchange stkATOM for ATOM without needing to unstake or pay a 1% fee. Moreover, stk assets can be combined with native assets to add liquidity in DEXs, earning higher yields.

$XPRT stake

Persistence, as an independent blockchain, also requires stake to enhance network security. It is very convenient to stake $XPRT in the Persistence official platform or certain wallets.

stake security

As a liquid staking platform, Persistence is one of the important cornerstones of the security of the Cosmos ecosystem. Both Persistence and pSTAKE are open-source programs, which is one of the guarantees of security. Among them, the pSTAKE program comes from the participation of 72 developers, with the most recent code submission being 2 days ago.

In addition, Persistence, pSTAKE collaborates with multiple security institutions to provide comprehensive support for the security of staking and re-staking. These security institutions cover various fields including blockchain and cryptocurrency security auditing, global security research consulting, smart contract security auditing, and vulnerability bounty platforms.

Re-staking

The Persistence team is building Restaking infrastructure in Cosmos, allowing users to deposit liquid staking tokens ( such as stkATOM, stTIA, stkDYDX, etc. ) into Persistence through platforms like pSTAKE. This enables them to restake assets and secure additional chains while earning extra rewards.

The Persistence re-staking module supports staking requests for various assets, such as staking equity tokens, stablecoins, LP tokens, etc.

Re-staking Alliance

The re-staking module of Persistence is developed based on the Alliance module. Alliance is an open-source Cosmos SDK module that facilitates assets to be staked from one blockchain to another, enabling inter-chain staking to form mutually beneficial relationships between blockchains.

Re-stake alliance to share staking rewards. Stakers of various assets distribute rewards according to the asset's reward weight. The reward weight for $XRPT is 1, while the reward weights for other assets are determined and adjusted through decentralized governance.

The Persistence staking asset alliance reward distribution mechanism forms an alliance with the re-staked assets, creating a community of shared interests, which is beneficial for enhancing the security and decentralization of the Cosmos ecosystem.

Re-staking yield source

The tokens used by the user for re-staking will be locked and the native tokens will be minted proportionally. The minted native tokens will enter the staking module to be staked to the validators in the role of a delegator.

For example, the stkATOM and stTIA staked by users will be locked by the restaking module on the Persistence chain and minted as $XPRT in proportion. These $XPRT will be staked to validators, and the staking rewards obtained will be distributed to stakers of tkATOM and stTIA.

This is the source of returns from Persistence's re-staking, which further enhances the security and liquidity of the Cosmos ecosystem.

Summary

Persistence chain provides an effective and secure economic infrastructure for liquid staking and re-staking within the Cosmos ecosystem. Through liquid staking products, Persistence is gradually deepening its influence in the Cosmos ecosystem, bringing higher security, asset liquidity, and ecological participation to the system.

Persistence has established an economic alliance for stakers through its innovative re-staking program. This alliance forms a cross-chain community of interests among stakers, which not only enhances mutual security but also improves the decentralization of the Cosmos ecosystem within the re-staking alliance.