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Stacks Ecosystem Q1 Recap: Bridges, Women of Bitcoin, Birth of the Bitcoin Odyssey

May 11, 2022

Growing up, all I wanted to do was tell stories of people doing things that pushed the boundaries of what was considered conventional. In the crypto world, there is no shortage of these kinds of stories. Within the Stacks ecosystem, we have so many builders blazing their own trails in order to build a better internet (no easy feat).

From Satoshibles building the first NFT bridge between Ethereum and Bitcoin, to the birth of the Bitcoin Odyssey Fund with Okcoin, we have seen what is possible when builders have the right resources at their disposal.

This past quarter, we also celebrated International Women's Day and saw female founders establish new use cases for IVF, bring on star talent to support their projects, and host virtual NFT gallery openings.

In this newsletter, you'll get a recap of some of the major happenings in the Stacks ecosystem. As the Stacks blockchain turned 1 year old this year, it is amazing to see how far teams have come in such little time.

Always be building,

Caitlin Eckvahl and the Stacks Foundation Team

(You may have received this email twice, Revue changed some email settings that resulted in most going to spam, so we've resent it. Apologies for any inconveniences, please enjoy this edition!)

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Below you'll find highlighted news and highlights from the first quarter of 2022 sorted by theme.

📈 State of the Network

🌉 Building Bridges

👩‍💼 Ladies of Bitcoin

💰 Bitcoin Odyssey

🚀 Bitcoin DeFi

🦄 Bitcoin NFT Report

➕ Much more

Check out this video to learn what Stacks is all about in just a minute!

📈 State of the Network

  • Stacks was named the #1 Web 3 Project on Bitcoin

  • Stacks crossed 400K wallet addresses

  • The network passed 1 million STX transactions

  • 200K+ NFTs minted on STX

  • Over $300m in new capital entered the ecosystem for Bitcoin builders

🌉 Building Bridges

A deeply-connected Stacks ecosystem starts with building bridges between other chains and in Q1, two teams worked to connect Stacks with more than 20 new chains including Ethereum, Solana, Near, and Celo.

Allbridge token bridge and Bitcoin software developer Daemon Technologies have partnered to provide the Stacks ecosystem with its first on-chain token bridge for the native Stacks (STX) token.

The Bitcoin-inspired Satoshibles NFT project began on Ethereum. Now, it's finding new life on Stacks thanks to a cross-chain bridge.

The Orbit Chain team will integrate the Stacks blockchain and turn their attention to creating bridges between Stacks’ Bitcoin-connected blockchain and Orbit Chain’s growing ecosystem of public blockchains.

👩‍💼 Ladies of Bitcoin

Who run the world? 🌎 In Q1, we celebrated International Women's Day with HeyLayer's metaverse gallery and recognized many of the women who make up the Stacks ecosystem, along with some new artists minting their first works on Stacks. Female founders across the ecosystem made celebrated their achievements in the world of fashion, healthcare, and entertainment, making the Stacks ecosystem a more vibrant and inclusive environment.

The “HerNFT” event featured the work of more than 30 female NFT artists, including Goldy Succi, Mother Pop, Kaylee Hawley and others. Their work on the Stacks blockchain will be on display in a virtual gallery curated specifically for this event, which started on Tuesday.

Healthcare data supply chain platform Eggschain and Boston IVF fertility clinic have started a partnership where Eggschain will use the Bitcoin blockchain to help secure and scale the data storage capabilities of Boston IVF.

Hollywood star and singer Lindsay Lohan has signed on to the Superfandom experiential NFT platform, to help attract more artists and entertainment figures.

💰 Bitcoin Odyssey: Fueling Bitcoin Builders

One of the biggest developments to occur this quarter was the birth of the Bitcoin Odyssey, a $165M pledge led by Okcoin, the Stacks Foundation, and Stacks Ventures designed to accelerate developers and teams building on Bitcoin. The pledge brings together the top names in crypto venture capital, including more than 15 participating partners such as Digital Currency Group, Blockdream Ventures, White Star Capital, and more.

The Bitcoin Odyssey is a year-long pledge taken by VC firms to deploy money into solutions that accelerate the adoption of bitcoin.

Also in the way of fueling builing on Bitcoin, Stacks Co-founder Muneeb Ali's Trust Machines raised $150M to 'build the largest ecosystem of Bitcoin applications and the underlying technologies.' Participating investors include Breyer Capital, Digital Currency Group, GoldenTree, Hivemind and Union Square Ventures.

🚀 Bitcoin DeFi

ALEX Launches Mainnet on Stacks

ALEX users will be able to use ALEX’s platform to lend a variety of crypto tokens, borrow at a fixed rate without risk of liquidation, deposit tokens to earn interest, and engage in yield farming.

Lydian is a community-driven DAO that features DeFi 2.0 mechanics at its core and resides on the Stacks Blockchain. Lydian is a yield-farming DAO and decentralized treasury management protocol which uses USDA to manage its treasury.

Introducing LBTC, a BTC-pegged token, based on STSW or STX as collateral. The LBTC Vault feature will now be open for users. LBTC is a BTC-pegged token issued with the Stackswap token (STSW) or…

🦄 Bitcoin NFT Report

In February, applications for the inaugural Mintery program went up, and by Bitcoin Unleashed in Miami in April, creators were sharing their progress and teasing upcoming collections. This 'NFT Accelerator' was run by the Stacks Foundation to help artists make the jump into the world of Web 3. Click through if you're interested in joining a cohort!

We are always very excited when DeFi and NFTs come together. This past quarter, Megapont announced in its newsletter that the MEGA token is coming to Stacks via ALEX to create the MEGA utility token. ALEX will assist in ensuring that the MEGA tokenomics are sensible and that the token is using audited, secure smart contracts.

Satoshibles announced its charitable campaign with Built With Bitcoin Foundation to raise funds for the foundation’s on-going efforts to build schools and communities around the world.

Bitcoin Monkeys announced $BANANA Staking

New NFT Projects Come to Stacks

Welcome Tiger Force 🐯 and Punks Army 💪! Both teams recently migrated from Solana over to Stacks, making for a more vibrant NFT community for the Bitcoin ecosystem.

STXNFT Releases New Features

Stacks Infrastructure and Ecosystem Initiatives

We're exploring the next evolution of the Stacks Foundation Grants Program, starting with how it might be well-suited for a DAO.

The Stacks Foundation Grants Program is looking for several community leaders to help drive the grants process. Ambassadors will function as part mentor, part project manager, part consultant, and part visionary.

Since the launch one year ago, seven chapters have launched across the globe in countries including Korea, Turkey, China, Pakistan, Japan, Russia, and India.

Learn about where you can find Clarity smart contract auditing resources.

The #1 Web 3.0 project on Bitcoin has a nearly unquenchable thirst for new talent, this new portal will help builders bolster their teams. All new job posts within the Stacks Ecosystem are currently free as they are being sponsored by the Stacks Foundation for ~6 months.

Immunefi, the leading bug bounty and security services platform for DeFi projects and decentralized networks, has opened its bug bounty program on Stacks. Up to $1,000,000 per bounty can be earned for eligible bugs.

New Listings & Integrations

STX Now on Coinbase, CoinList, and Binance 🥳

Stacking is now available on Binance, the largest exchange in the world in terms of the daily trading volume of cryptocurrencies. Binance users can opt-in for Stacking via Binance Stacking to earn BTC rewards directly in their wallets.

MoonPay, the leading fiat onramp for crypto is now supporting Stacks. With over 5M customers, MoonPay, with its widgets and APIs, as well as its newer NFT Checkout, is making Web 3.0 more accessible.

At Stacks' Bitcoin Unleashed, Unbanked announced its integration with the Stacks blockchain which will enable users to spend STX tokens with debit cards in approximately 60 countries.

Popular Korea-based D’CENT wallet, which features robust mobile apps, as well as biometric and hardware support, has rolled out support for Stacking.

By integrating Stacks with Creditcoin, a whole new pool of users in Africa will be able to leverage Bitcoin DeFi, giving them direct exposure to Stacking. Integration is expected to go live in Q3 2022.

Thanks for Coming to Bitcoin Unleashed 🌴☀️ 💜

To celebrate all that has been achieved within the first few months of the year, the global Stacks community gathered in Miami for Bitcoin Unleashed and Bitcoin 2022. Folks came in from all around the world and it was amazing to see the community IRL. Stay tuned for the next Stacks event!

Thank you for joining us, enjoy photos from the event.

CNBC's MacKenzie Sigalos breaks down how North America's largest bitcoin conference, Bitcoin 2022, has changed over the years. CNBC's Tanaya Macheel speaks with Brittany Laughlin, executive director at Stacks Open Internet Foundation, about building a DeFi network on top of bitcoin.

CoinMarketCap was on the ground at Bitcoin Unleashed and gathered hot takes from the Stacks Foundation, CityCoins, Hiro, and Stacks Ventures.

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Disclaimer: The information shared in this email is strictly for informational purposes. You should not take its content, opinions, and/or descriptions provided as technical advice, legal advice, financial advice, or investment advice. See full disclaimer at stacks.org/terms.