Conquer Cryptocurrency Volatility with Olympus

In any market, volatility is a blessing and a curse. Investors rejoice when the market flourishes, but losses are unpredictable and potentially devastating. High-risk, high-reward conditions — like those in today’s cryptocurrency market — are attractive to players who can stomach the sizeable risks. But what if you’re looking for less risky ways to invest? Navigating the volatile cryptocurrency market can be tricky even in the best of conditions. Sometimes we need more mature ways to invest.

Currently, the cryptocurrency market offers few options to hedge risk or to incorporate into everyday investment portfolios. Enter Olympus.

Introducing Crypto-Derivatives

Olympus seeks to calm market volatility with a new class of crypto-derivatives. These derivatives will enable the cryptocurrency market to mature in a steady and stable fashion. With our private ICO at full speed and our public ICO coming up in December, we at Olympus Labs will be offering our first two structured financial products:

• Olympus Bitcoin Collateral — coming late 2017/early 2018
• Indices — coming Q1 2018

These products are the first steps to a long journey to achieving our vision of a mature cryptocurrency market.

Olympus Bitcoin Collateral

Olympus Bitcoin Collateral, our first derivative offering, allows users to borrow and lend Bitcoin, using Bitcoin as collateral. Here’s how it works.

Say you want to use Bitcoin to invest in an ICO, altcoins, or some other project you find worthwhile, but you want to continue to hold the Bitcoin you already own. Through Olympus Bitcoin Collateral — a smart contract — you can pledge your owned Bitcoin as collateral in exchange for loaned Bitcoin from a lender. You can use this loan in any way you choose while still keeping your original Bitcoin, provided you return the loan with interest to close out the smart contract. Best of all, you get to keep any additional profits.

Here’s what it looks like from the other side. Potential lenders with a store of Bitcoin — gained through mining or simply by purchasing large quantities — need a way for their investments to increase in value apart from general value appreciation of the market. By loaning their Bitcoin, lenders benefit from earned interest on their Bitcoin. Lenders can also rest easy knowing that the smart contract protects against borrowers defaulting on their loans.

Olympus Indices

Our second product is a highly customizable index, which investors and developers can build and modify to meet their own unique needs. There is no limit to the indices or index funds that can be created on the Olympus platform.

What is an index? An index is basically a measurement that keeps track of growth in the overall market or specific sectors. Indices (indexes) can be turned into portfolios or index funds that reflect the growth of the index. When users invest in an index fund, they allow their investments to see long-term returns without close management.

For example, you may want to keep track of a basket of alt-coins that you think represent the health of the overall market. With Olympus, you can create that index, and then invest in it, allowing your investment to grow with that particular group of alt-coins. Best of all, other people can invest in your index, too.

Our market indices also allow Olympus to partner with exchanges and other trading platforms. For example, exchanges (such as CoinNest and ShapeShift) will be able to develop custom indices to track their own performance, and they can offer index funds as products to their users. These partnerships are mutually beneficial: the exchanges provide liquidity to Olympus products, and Olympus allows the exchanges to offer more products to their users. Moreover, these relationships can help our partners gain new users, while existing users will be able to invest more wisely and innovatively, thanks to our products.

More to come

Bitcoin Collateral and Indices are only the first two of the many crypto-derivatives that Olympus Labs plan to offer. These products and more will be available through the Olympus Wallet, which launches in December 2017.

To learn more about Olympus and to participate as a member of our committed community, please visit our website at www.olympuslabs.io.