If you’re new to the Terra ecosystem, or have been around for a while and are wondering how you can benefit from staking your $LUNA, you’ve come to the right place.
Stader Labs is a platform designed for easy to use and secure staking of $LUNA by utilizing categorized vaults of validators within the Terra network. This platform was made with the main focus of simplifying the process of staking for the average crypto user and in turn, bring in more attention to the platform. The staking as a service platform that is offered provides many benefits to the way the proof of stake network operates; one of these benefits being the further decentralization of the network while maintaining a subsidization of gas fees and a better distribution of the staked rewards amongst its userbase.
Now that you have a better understanding of what Stader is and the general use case of its platform, enter Stader Stake+, a new feature which opens up staking capabilities by being able to select your preferred validator to stake your $LUNA with. Stader has already brought onboard 6 validators which you’ll be able to select from: Coinhall, Orbital Command, Galactic Punks (one of my personal favourites!), Smart Stake, PFC Validator, and TerraBitesPod.
Not only is Stader Stake+ providing $LUNA stakers the option to stake with their favourite validator, but you’ll be able to reap the rewards by being able to auto-compound staking rewards, collecting airdrops in a single click, deploying different strategies, and receiving incentivized benefits provided by the validator of choice. Stader Stake+ provides benefits for both delegators and validators: delegators being able to maximize their airdrops/incentivized benefits from the selected validator, and validators being able to grow the number of delegators in their pool, furthermore increasing the level of decentralization in the Terra ecosystem. Stader Labs is starting with the 6 validators mentioned above but will continue to onboard more based on a phased manner which will increase the number of validators over time.
There are currently three stake pools on Stader which are curated for different benefits for the delegator: Blue Chip, Community, and Airdrops Plus.
As you can see, all Stader Stake Pools include airdrops, minimizing slashing, and most importantly for the Terra network, promoting decentralization. Listed under the Airdrops Plus pool, this is where the Validator protocol airdrops are incentivized as rewards. Given the upcoming release of Stader Stake+, we will see 6 validators that have provided the most contributions within the community thus far.
Here is a list of contributions to the Terra ecosystem that each of these validators provide:
Coinhall:
Easy to use Terra price tracker providing live charts of Terra based altcoins, a DEX aggregator, and detailed analytics in real-time across every AMM DEX operating in the Terra network.
Website: https://coinhall.org/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/coinhall_org
Smart Stake:
Staking validator that provides a professional and clean interface while displaying real-time blockchain analytics. The guys over at Smart Stake have over 20+ years of enterprise IT experience under their belt with security as their focus while providing health analytics of their staking servers for the delegators to view.
Website: https://www.smartstake.io/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SmartStake
Terra Bites Pod:
Podcast covering the DeFi ecosystem of $LUNA and its ecosystem altcoins. They provide detailed insight into Terra based projects and give an overview of important updates that directly affect the growth of the Terra ecosystem.
Website: https://anchor.fm/terrabites
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TerraBitesPod
Orbital Command:
Community based validator dedicated to the growth and security of the Terra network. The Orbital Command validator is heavily involved in community commitment/engagement and educating its users of the Terra vision all while providing a high-availability infrastructure for delegators to stake their $LUNA.
Website: https://www.orbitalcommand.io/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/orbital_command
Galactic Punks Validator:
Validator brought to life by members of the Galactic DAO community (consists of Galactic Punk NFT holders). The main objective of the Galactic Punks Validator is to: secure the Terra network, provide value for $LUNA delegators as well as Galactic DAO members, develop another source of revenue for the growing Galactic DAO treasury, reward $LUNA delegators with weekly Galactic Punk NFT airdrop raffles, and issue governance proposals to the Galactic DAO community before voting under the Galactic Punks Validator.
Both Galactic DAO members (Galactic Punk NFT holders) as well as delegators who are staking under the Galactic Punks Validator (but don’t own/hold a Galactic Punk NFT) reap the benefits:
1) Galactic DAO members (Galactic Punk NFT holders) benefit from being able to work on proposals via governance and voting to further increase the utility and mainstream adoption of the Galactic Punk NFT (blue chip NFT of the Terra ecosystem in my opinion!).
2) Users staking under the Galactic Punks Validator (but don’t own/hold a Galactic Punk NFT) benefit from being able to delegate their $LUNA to a low-commission, heavily reliable, and decentralized validator while also being entered into a raffle to potentially win an airdropped Galactic Punk NFT! This is funded by utilizing 90% of the validator commissions on a week time frame to sweep the floor punks and airdrop to a random winner (who doesn’t want a FREE Galactic Punk NFT?!) that meets the minimum requirement of at least 10 $LUNA staked.
Website: https://galacticpunks.io/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/galactic_punks
PFC Validator:
Top-tier validator that is run by developers with over 20+ years of experience in the industry. They are community oriented and transparency is their focus in making the Terra network better while providing delegators rewards for using their platform.
Website: https://pfc-validator.github.io/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/PFC_Validator
With so many benefits that Stader Stake+ seeks to provide, the growth of the Terra blockchain will continue to expand which will further harden and decentralize the network. As more validators are added later down the road as growth continues, delegators will be able to soon choose who they want to stake with and what strategies they want to deploy to continue compounding their $LUNA stacks while enjoying the different benefits that validators incentivize.
Stay tuned and follow Stader Labs for further development of Stake+:
Website: https://staderlabs.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/staderlabs
Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/switzcrypto
