Sommelier Is Going Multichain Via Axelar
As we’ve previously stated, Sommelier’s mission is to make DeFi more accessible, profitable, and efficient for everyone. Although we have made some progress in realizing that vision through products like Real Yield USD and Real Yield ETH, we believe that there are still significant groups of crypto users outside of Ethereum who could benefit from Sommelier’s intelligent vaults. Therefore, it is a strategic priority for Sommelier to upgrade its infrastructure and go multichain.
We are pleased to announce that Sommelier will use Axelar and its newly-minted Cosmos General Message Passing (GMP) technology to support vaults on Arbitrum One, and we plan to expand to further Layer-2 (L2) and EVM networks in the future.
Meet Axelar and General Message Passing
Axelar is a proof of stake blockchain for delivering secure interchain communication. Its aim is to enable dApp users to interact with any asset, any application, on any chain, with one click. You can think of it as Stripe for Web3. Developers interact with a simple API atop a permissionless network that routes messages and ensures network security via proof-of-stake consensus.
Cosmos-natives appreciate why blockchain interoperability should be far richer than bridging tokens. From the beginning, the vision of Cosmos has been one of many sovereign blockchains in deep relationships with each other. Sommelier has been a pioneer in bringing that approach to Ethereum, acting as a co-processing appchain to enable far more sophisticated vaults than exist on Ethereum alone.
Axelar GMP furthers this mission by allowing for any information to pass between Cosmos chains like Sommelier and L2s like Arbitrum One. It represents an evolution of Axelar’s secure cross-chain communication network, which has proven instrumental in moving liquidity among a variety of blockchain ecosystems. Now with GMP, Axelar is enabling far more complex cross-chain interactions, including applications like Sommelier.
Sommelier and Axelar GMP
Sommelier’s cross-chain expansion with Axelar heralds a new generation of interchain applications that compose the best of multiple Web3 ecosystems. GMP is the means for Sommelier to turbocharge DeFi across the EVM world.
Already, the Real Yield ETH and Real Yield USD vaults have gained significant traction on Ethereum, offering the best organic yields on stablecoins and the best way to go long on ETH and ETH liquid staking tokens, respectively. To send strategy instructions to these vaults, Sommelier has used a custom fork of the Gravity bridge.
Since 2021 when we launched our Gravity bridge to Ethereum, a tremendous amount of progress has been made in the interoperability space. Axelar has gained significant traction as a leading cross-chain communication technology, demonstrating both strong security and rich functionality.
There are several reasons why Axelar GMP is an excellent complement to Sommelier. First, Sommelier’s bridging needs are unique; rather than tokens, strategy instructions are what Sommelier sends to other chains for vaults to execute. The all-purpose functionality of GMP makes it fully capable of supporting this use-case. Second, Axelar has a robust network connecting to a variety of L2s and EVM-compatible chains giving Sommelier instant ubiquity across DeFi. This significantly accelerates Sommelier’s go-to-market to new ecosystems because we no longer have to maintain multiple deployments of our Gravity bridge. And third, Axelar is natively composable with IBC, paving the way towards deeper Cosmos-native integrations with Sommelier.
Sommelier’s Expansion to Arbitrum One and the Broader Layer-2 Ecosystem
Sommelier vaults on Arbitrum One are the beginning for Sommelier and GMP connections between the Cosmos and EVM ecosystems. Arbitrum’s Ethereum L2 provides users with fast, cheap transactions, which has attracted a flourishing ecosystem of decentralized applications and over $2B of assets.
On Arbitrum, Sommelier vaults will be able to access unique DeFi applications such as the GMX perpetual exchange and Dopex options protocol. Strategy providers have a broadened design space with these protocols, and with low gas fees on Arbitrum, Sommelier vaults can be more efficient and more flexible to make frequent rebalances.
Next, GMP will enable Sommelier to run vaults on additional L2s, opening up even more possibilities for strategy providers. Get connected with Sommelier’s community of DeFi enthusiasts, strategists, and cutting-edge technologists to stay up-to-date on new strategies and multi-chain deployments. And find out more about Axelar’s extensive capabilities with Cosmos-EVM General Message Passing (GMP).
About Sommelier
Sommelier is an innovative asset management protocol whose mission is to make DeFi more accessible, profitable, and efficient for everyone. Our advanced technology built on the Cosmos SDK, enables intelligent vaults that can optimize portfolios, trade long-short, borrow-lend, and farm. Independent strategists can leverage the power of off-chain computation to bring algorithmic vaults on-chain, allowing vaults to dynamically adapt to market conditions and provide enhanced opportunities and risk mitigation to users. All vaults are enabled by audited smart contracts and controlled by protocol governance, ensuring transparency and security.
