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

Persistence is one of the application chains in the Cosmos ecosystem that first adopted IBC, CosmWasm, and the liquid staking module (LSM). By continuously deepening its POS and liquid staking related products, Persistence has built a complete framework for liquid staking and re-staking in the Cosmos ecosystem.

On December 5, 2023, the Cosmos community voted to allocate 600,000 ATOM for the growth of liquid staking for pSTAKE. According to the agreement, pSTAKE will share 15% of the liquid staking income with Cosmos Hub.

Overview of the Persistence Ecosystem

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.one has established 121 channel connections with 44 other zones in the Interchain network. This highlights its status as a highly interconnected node, able to interact with many other zones through multiple channels.

Currently, 74.7% of the network token ($XPRT) is in stake. A higher staking rate usually indicates a higher level of network security and active participation. The current annualized yield for staking is 16.7%.

The infrastructure of Persistence is composed 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 trades, including 616 IBC trades. There were 932 active addresses and 86 active IBC addresses. Notably, the IBC inflow has consistently exceeded the outflow, which may indicate that an increasing amount of value is flowing into Persistence and participating in staking.

Technical Support

Persistence supports the CosmWasm framework, allowing developers to write secure and interoperable smart contracts using the Rust language. DApps developed based on the CosmWasm framework can run across chains through IBC, providing convenient, secure, and efficient technical support for liquid staking.

Persistence connects with 54 Cosmos application chains through IBC, achieving trustless communication, transfer, staking, and liquid staking of tokens, laying a solid ecological foundation for staking and liquid staking in the Cosmos ecosystem.

In addition, Persistence has also implemented ICA Liquid Staking using Interchain Accounts (ICA). Interchain Accounts allow an account on one chain to perform operations on another chain, significantly enhancing the efficiency and flexibility of staking and restaking.

liquid staking

In the Cosmos ecosystem, liquid staking involves two main roles: validators and delegators.

Stakers (i.e., delegators) can freely choose the validator nodes to delegate to when staking. Validators are responsible for running hardware and blockchain applications based on the Cosmos SDK, reaching consensus with other validators, proposing new blocks on-chain, and validating them.

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

It is evident that the liquid staking in the Cosmos ecosystem essentially prevents malicious behavior through economic incentives and potential penalties. Validators and delegators share the responsibility of maintaining network efficiency and security while earning corresponding token rewards.

pSTAKE stake

pSTAKE provides a simple 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 the staking is complete, the pSTAKE protocol will issue the corresponding staking rights tokens to the user's wallet. For example, if you stake ATOM, the user will receive stkATOM.

automatic compound interest

Taking stkATOM as an example, users receive daily staking rewards in the form of ATOM, and this portion of the rewards is automatically staked to continue earning rewards. This means that the number of staked ATOM corresponding to each stkATOM will increase, allowing users to receive more ATOM when they unstake. Therefore, the staking rewards for users are reflected in the growth of the stkATOM/ATOM ratio.

Unstake

When users cancel their stake, they need to wait for 21 to 25 days; they can also choose to pay a 1% fee to immediately release the stake. When users retrieve their stake, the corresponding stk assets will be destroyed.

stake derivatives

More stk asset derivatives have been launched in Persistence and the entire Cosmos ecosystem.

For example, in DEX products, stkATOM can be directly exchanged for ATOM without the need to unstake or pay a 1% fee. Furthermore, the combination of stk assets and native assets can also add liquidity in the DEX, yielding higher returns. For instance, in Dexter under Persistence, the expected annualized return of stkDYDX + DYDX can reach as high as 45.82%.

$XPRT stake

As an independent blockchain, Persistence also requires staking to enhance network security. Users can easily stake $XPRT on the official Persistence website or in the Keplr wallet.

stake security

As a liquid staking platform, Persistence is one of the important cornerstones of security in the Cosmos ecosystem.

Persistence and pSTAKE are both open-source programs, which is an important guarantee of security. Among them, the pSTAKE program has been developed by 72 developers, with the most recent code submission made 2 days ago.

In addition, Persistence and pSTAKE collaborate with multiple security agencies to provide comprehensive support for the security of staking and re-staking. These agencies include well-known blockchain and crypto security audit firms Halborn, PeckShield, Certora, Hexens, and Notional, global security research and consulting company Trail of Bits, smart contract and related security audit and consulting firms Solidified, ConsenSys Diligence, Oak Security, DeFi leading bug bounty platform Immunefi, and the blockchain security real-time monitoring and alert network Forta.

Re-stake

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

The re-staking module of Persistence supports staking requests for various assets, including staking governance tokens, stablecoins, LP tokens, and more.

Re-stake Alliance

The re-staking module of Persistence is developed based on the Alliance module. Alliance is an open-source Cosmos SDK module built by Terraform Labs that enables assets to be staked from one blockchain to another, allowing inter-chain staking to create mutually beneficial relationships between blockchains.

For example, stakers of $XPRT, stkATOM, and stkTIA can join the Persistence re-staking asset alliance after staking the corresponding assets in Persistence. Stakers of stkATOM and stkTIA can receive re-staking rewards, as well as $XPRT.

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

Re-staking income sources

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

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

Summary

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

Persistence's innovative liquid staking solution establishes an economic alliance for liquid stakers, forming a cross-chain community of shared interests among them. This not only enhances mutual security but also increases the level of decentralization within the liquid staking alliance of the Cosmos ecosystem.