The Big Unlock: Hot Kusama Summer
Over 1.2 Million KSM is Returning to the Dotsama Ecosystem on August 8th
TLDR;
- A recap of the crowdloans & how they work
- Kintsugi Wins Auction 44
- The big unlock is here: over 1.2 Million KSM from previous crowdloan auctions unlocks
- Here’s how to put your KSM to work to make the most out your returned KSM
Kusama is About to Bring the Heat to DeFi
If you’re new to the Polkadot and Kusama ecosystem, crowdloans can be hard to navigate. However, the crowdloans for parachain slots are essential to the primary goal of the Dotsama world: to innovate through interoperability and collaboration.
Disclaimer: Nothing in this document is intended to be financial advice. As always, do your own research on the risks of staking, liquidity pooling, and trading cryptocurrencies.
A Quick Explainer on Auctions, Leases, and Unlocks
In the Kusama ecosystem, participants can lock their KSM in Kusama parachain auctions to show their support of the project. During each parachain auction period, multiple projects will compete against each other for slots. The winners for each round are based on the amount of KSM raised in the crowdloan.
The key takeaway point:
Whether a project wins or loses the spot, the people who locked their assets always receive their KSM back.
Additionally, if the parachain they supported wins the auction, crowdloaners are rewarded for their support, usually by an airdrop of tokens based upon their total contribution of KSM,m alongside other boosts and benefits.
Parachains compete for a slot in a certain lease period. Once their lease is up, their slot is up for auction again, and the KSM from the crowdloan is released back to contributors.
Kintsugi Wins Auction 44
There’s good news for Kintsugi Veterans. Kintsugi, the canary network of Interlay, secured its second parachain slot on Kusama on July 17th, renewing the lease for another 48 weeks.
It’s been an exciting year for Kintsugi. We launched the world’s first fully decentralized Bitcoin bridge with kBTC, which is no small feat. In a short time, we’ve managed to accomplish:
- The minting of 27.70605376 kBTC through Kintsugi’s DApp
- We now have 62 vaults running on our network
- There is currently over $2,1mm USD of collateral locked in Kintsugi
- Stay updated on the stats in real-time via the Kintsugi DApp
Unlocking the Treasure Chest
Polkadot and Kusama have a regimented schedule of parachain auctions beginning and ending. Consequently, a large amount of assets are released back to the loaners at the end of each leasing period. It just so happens that the KSM from our first leasing period will be unlocking soon, on August 8th, along with 5 other parachains on Kusama. This post contains a helpful diagram of the Kusama parachain auction page.
The next unlock will commence on Block Number #13910400. Here’s a breakdown of the amount of KSM that will be unlocked back into the wallets of Kusama natives in a few weeks:
Amount of KSM to be unlocked:
How to make the most of your unlocked Kusama
With 1,251,097.02 KSM re-entering the ecosystem, we thought we’d provide you with some options on what to do with your newly unlocked chaotic liquidity.
Lock KSM in a Kintsugi Vault
Liquidity may burn a hole through your pocket, but it will stay put in a Kintsugi vault. The community has been running strong since October 2021, now’s the chance to take the opportunity and help bring interoperable, fully decentralized, and radically open Bitcoin. Start running a Vault and use your KSM to secure decentralized BTC.
All you need to do is:
- Install the Vault client following our guide
- Provide KSM collateral to your Vault
- Back decentralized kBTC with your KSM collateral
- Earn KINT block rewards and protocol fees
During the previous ‘Big Unlock’ in April of 2022, along with the start of a bear market, Kintsugi was forged with gold. Even with the flood of KSM and the 40% decrease in volume locked in DeFi, no vaults were liquidated because of price volatility.
Within a few months of launching Kintsugi, 62 Vaults are up and operating at the date of this post, holding over $2mm in KSM despite turbulent market conditions. We value chaos in the Kusama ecosystem, but from chaos, we must find order. We learn from breaking stuff. Like the Japanese ceramic art form it's named after, Kintsugi is the result of breaking stuff and putting it back together again with liquid gold, making it stronger than ever.
If you’re looking for a safe and lucrative (not financial advice, do your own research, you know the drill) place to store your Kusama liquidity now that it’s unlocked, Kintsugi is battle tested and ready. If you lock your KSM in a Kintsugi vault, you’ll earn both KINT block rewards and kBTC protocol fees.
You’ll also be supporting the first truly decentralized BTC bridge, which is cool if you ask us.
Other Ways to Use Your KSM
The short answer: a lot.
Here’s the longer answer:
KSM and Kintsugi: Better Together
As mentioned above, you can run a Vault on the Kintsugi network and become part of the interoperable revolution of BTC or alternatively, maybe you’d prefer to store your BTC in one of our trust-less Kintsugi vaults and mint some sweet sweet kBTC.
With our second parachain slot win, we’re not going anywhere. Be a part of the innovation as we bring Bitcoin to DeFi by locking your liquidity with Kintsugi.
If you don’t want to spend all your Kusama in one place, here are some options to experiment with emerging DeFi tools in the ecosystem.
Deposit Your KSM Into a Liquidity Pool
Liquidity Pools (LP) are a pool of assets provided by users to a DEX (Decentralized Exchange) in exchange for rewards. There are a number of DEXes to LP your Kusama in the Dotsama ecosystem.
Karura
Karura, the canary network of Acala, and the Kusama ecosystem’s first all-in-one DeFi application. Visit their DApp to bridge your Kusama to Karura, stake your Kusama, or stake your Kusama to mint LKSM and increase your rewards. Another option is minting aUSD, the Acala stablecoin, from your KSM so you can contribute to liquidity pools with different pairings of tokens in the Kusama ecosystem, including kBTC.
Put your goggles on and dive in to the aUSD/kBTC liquidity pool. You’ll earn rewards in aUSD, KINT, and KAR. That’s a pool party I would love to attend.
You can also swap your KSM to KINT and kBTC via Karura’s DApp.
Craving that stability?
Perhaps you’d prefer to jump into the kBTC/wBTC Stable pool on Solarbeam (Moonriver), where anyone contributing towards the pool can earn rewards in SOLAR / MOVR and xcKINT.
Be sure to check out our docs page with more information on how you can earn with your kBTC
Stake: Medium Rare
You can swap your KSM for KINT and stake on our DApp to earn rewards.
Stake KSM on the Kusama Relaychain
You can stake your KSM directly to the Kusama relay chain. An in-depth guide is available from Kusama below.
Experiment with Interoperable DeFi Tools
New projects are constantly emerging to push the boundaries of Kusama and generate some of that chaos that we all know and love.
Altair has plans to bridge Kusama with RWA (real-world assets) as a canary network of the Centrifuge blockchain. Interoperability now means more than chain-to-chain. Altair is building tokenization of the most experimental assets.
Genshiro serves as the testing ground for Equilibrium. Use their DApp to experiment with cutting-edge features and assets not yet available on their Polkadot parachain.
There are many more options in the Kusama ecosystem to experiment with your tokens, including Shiden for DeFi and NFTs, Basilisk for liquidity bootstrapping, and more.
You Could Always Sell…
But come on, who would do that with so much incredible innovation emerging from the Kusama ecosystem?
In Closing
If you were a crowdloan contributor (thank you!), you have some Kusama coming your way. However, you don’t need to leave the Kintsugi ecosystem to continue earning rewards on your newly freed liquidity.
In the spirit of interoperability, our mission as well as the mission of both Polkadot and Kusama, you have endless options to use your KSM in DeFi across chains and platforms.
However, if you use your unlocked Kusama in Kintsugi vaults, you will be supporting the first truly decentralized BTC bridge in existence. Not only will you be a part of a DeFi innovation like no other, you will also securely and trustlessly lock your liquidity and earn rewards — a great way to spend Kusama summer.
About Interlay
We envision a future where blockchains seamlessly connect and interact: anyone can use any digital asset on any blockchain, trustless and without limitations. Interlay works with Bitcoin, Ethereum, Polkadot, Cosmos, and others to expand interoperability, capital efficiency, and openness.
Our flagship product is iBTC — Bitcoin on any blockchain. A 1:1 Bitcoin-backed asset, fully collateralized, interoperable, and censorship-resistant, realizing the true free nature of BTC and decentralized finance.
Follow both Interlay and Kintsugi on Twitter, join our Telegram, and hop in our Discord to keep up to date with daily updates from the team.
