Since the beginning of the blockchain digital economy, there have been many shifts, trends, and use cases that have accompanied its development. The blockchain’s original utilitarian value was exclusively for financial matters, creating the first-ever cryptocurrency, the Bitcoin, and its issuing blockchain. However, this practical value gets expanded every day. NFTs are one such expansion of possible use case of blockchain technology that has found relevance in gaming, digital identity, licensing, certificates, and fine art.
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are also known as crypto-collectibles. They can not be divided, maintain uniqueness, and characterize scarcity associated with cryptocurrencies, ultimately driving up their value. Also embedded in NFT’s attributes is the ability to represent a unique digital asset, which can be digital assets or tokenized versions of real-world assets. Initially launched on the Ethereum blockchain using the ERC-721 standard, the NFT industries have since expanded into other blockchains, with blockchain companies like WAX becoming the highest issuance of NFTs collectibles currently.
NFTs contain identifying information recorded in their smart contracts. They differ distinctly from regular cryptocurrencies in that each token is indivisible with properties that cant be shared with another tokens. Traditional cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are divisible and are interchangeable, aka, fungible. For example, it is practically impossible to split one NFT collectible into new identities and owners, but entirely possible to do so with Bitcoin. One Bitcoin can change hands over time, and each Bitcoin is the same as the other; what may change with its movement might be the asset’s price.
NFTs have their own specific set of attributes (e.g., off-chain and on-chain metadata), making them unique. This uniqueness means that only one type of NFT can ever be created and it can not be interchanged with an identical one. NFT’s highlight the uniqueness and scarcity of the broader use of blockchain. It has found its increased relevance in the areas of Artwork and Gaming. Since no two artworks are unique with fungible properties in mind, the same principles apply to certain gaming items.
There are various frameworks and issuance of NFTs, the most prominent standard is the ERC-721, which is the first standard created for the distribution of this asset class. A more improved standard is the ERC-1155, which has enabled a contract to store both fungible and non-fungible assets, improving the industry’s convenience and opportunities therein.
Since its creation, WAX blockchain has been focusing heavily on the design, issuance, and profitability of NFT and has been the most active in terms of NFTs transactions. It is displacing Ethereum that initially brought in the NFT craze of 2016, causing a gas war at the time. WAX blockchain improved on the ease of transacting with NFTs, with no traffic congestion nor increased costs to move NFTs. The ease of acquiring NFTs is high when compared to other issuing blockchain types. With a simple creation of an account, transacting in and on NFTs, is enabled automatically.
NFTs can be used by blockchain decentralized applications (Dapp) to issue unique digital assets, identification, and collectibles. Since NFTs trade on the blockchain, you have a lot of freedom regarding what you can use them for:
NFTs help solves high inflation in gaming economies. Since most games have their economy and revenue generation strategies figured out, NFTs bring it a step further by allowing for the unique identification of a game and its features. Another exciting use of NFTs is the tokenization of real-world assets that can be stored and traded on a blockchain-enabled wallet and marketplace, respectively. Keeping digital identity is a use case that NFTs have helped improve tremendously using blockchain’s trustless property.
You don’t discuss NFTs or Blockchain gaming without mentioning the “OG” of them all. The first Cryptokitties collectibles were minted in 2016, which were some of the first non-fungible tokens. Each blockchain-based collectible cat is unique from the other. If you send someone a Cryptokitties collectible, you’ll receive a different collectible that’s distinctly different in properties from the one sent.
Each cryptokitty can have a combination of different properties, including age, breed, and color, as each of them is unique and can not be interchanged with each other. To date, no gas fee era on the Ethereum blockchain has been as high as the days when Cryptokitties was popular.
Many argue that NFTs are not used for their original intended purpose. But more of a speculation asset these days, with high-interest from traders who seek to profit from the high return of NFTs collectibles. With the growing craze, scam rates are increasing as well. Fake arts and artists are becoming commonplace. The idea that art can never be copied is fueling nefarious activities as rug pull cases build up.
NFTs are witnessing growing speculation among NFT fans, leaving NFTS on track to be a massive industry in the future; collectible assets like CryptoKitties and CryptoPunks have proven the potential in the past. However, it shouldn’t be used for its monetary value solely but for its actual use case, which is the basis of its creation. Understandably, traders want to profit, but that, as the sole purpose, won’t do well with the original intention behind NFTs. More blockchains have started issuing their own NFTs; right now, the top two blockchains are Ethereum and the WAX blockchain; the industry awaits other blockchains to begin their issuance. And who knows, we can have NFTs innovate activities like gaming and artwork in the traditional technology.
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Venus Protocol has announced that it is now fully upgraded to Chainlink. Venus had earlier dropped the VIP-23 proposal to allow for an upgrade on ChainLink as its oracle solution will provide a robust infrastructure to secure critical lending/borrowing functions and push prices to higher levels. The upgrade will allow Venus to leverage on Chainlink to create a more secure, trusted, and liquid market on the Binance Smart Chain (BSC).
Venus is a synthetic money market and stablecoin protocol built on the BSC. With its upgrade to Chainlink as an oracle solution, Venus has now leveraged Chainlink to its markets to its price collateral during both loan issuance and liquidation processes. The VIP 213 proposal deployed for the upgrade in Chainlink will provide security and reliability to the Venus Protocol allowing for the timely update of prices and automation of the Venus Market.
Built by crypto wallet and debit card company Swipe, Venus Protocol is the first collateral loan platform on BSC. With Venus, lenders can provide liquidity on various assets and earn interest in LP, there is also an option to take loans in other currencies or mint VAI— the first decentralized stablecoin built on BSC, Venus's stablecoin. One of the benefits of running on BSC is that users will be able to get fast, low-cost transactions while being able to access a deep network of wrapped tokens and liquidity. The way the Venus market works requires price data to determine a fully algorithmic money market such as in loan issuance and loan liquidations. Every time a user requests a loan, a fully algorithmic market is needed to determine the loan size and underlying collateral. Venus also needs to have its prices aggregated and price adjusted to suit market realities, which the BSC does not allow, hence the need for Chainlink.
According to Joelito Lizarondo, founder of Venus Protocol and the CEO of Swipe Wallet:
“As the market leader in providing credit to the BSC ecosystem, it was critical that we scale up our security by upgrading to Chainlink as a means of thoroughly protecting our users’ funds and guaranteeing they alway get fair market prices. Not only are we able to leverage Chainlink’s time-tested security, but it’s native operation on BSC allows us to get consistently fresh data for a much lower price.”
The need to utilize Chainlink’s oracle solution is founded in a desire to provide a more robust and proven infrastructure suitable for Venus’ lending/borrowing functions. The integration with Chainlink is also essential as Venus has the most Total Value Locked (TVL) on BSC, so a superior oracle was needed to increase efficiency. With the upgrade to Venus, users can now expect high-speed data from several premium off-chain data aggregators like BraveNewCoin, plus a high level of security and decentralization.
Chainlink is an oracle protocol on the BSC, providing tamper-proof data and transactions. Chainlink enables developers to connect to any blockchain in a secure way and to power universally connected smart contracts. Chainlink is utilized by organizations to get reliable, secured and trusted data feeds.
Venus is a synthetic money market and stablecoin protocol built on the BSC. With its upgrade to Chainlink as an oracle solution, Venus has now leveraged Chainlink to its markets to its price collateral during both loan issuance and liquidation processes.
Their algorithmic-based money market system is built on the BSC to ensure a completely decentralised lending and credit system in DeFi. With Venus, users can use the collateral supplied to the market to borrow other assets and to mint synthetic stablecoins with over-collateralized positions that protect the protocol.
Upgrading their oracles to the highly-regarded Chainlink product will no doubt provide a boost to Venus. This partnership will both increase security as well as transaction efficiency, granting Venus access to a highly-organized and efficient collection of multi-chain data practically instantaneously. Users of Venus should see increased value from using the project, and can rest assured that their transactions are being handled safely.
In a move that will satisfy investor curiosity, Beefy Finance has given a transparent breakdown of its fees. The Binance Smart Chain(BSC))-based yield aggregator decided to take a transparent route breaking down its fees in its fifth Bulletin. According to the yield aggregator, they understand that fees take away from the proceeds users obtain in their yields and that is why they charge the least amount of fees possible. Beefy Finance is comparing the fee structure of yield optimizers to that of traditional finance. Aside from Beefy Finance, another BSC-based yield aggregator in Autofarm also made a compilation of its fees and returns. Let’s dive into how these fees are different from standard financial institutional fees, and potential benefits derived from these differences.
For every transaction carried out, whether in the traditional finance system or the cryptoverse, a fee is incurred. In the traditional finance sphere, transaction costs are expenses incurred when buying or selling a good or service. They represent the labor required to bring the goods or service to the user and include brokers' commissions and spreads. These transaction costs result in the creation of industries that focus on nothing more but facilitating exchanges, thereby tripling costs for the added middlemen. However, with yield optimizers like Beefy Finance or Autofarm, transaction fees collected are utilized for various purposes, including community engagement, salary payment for the team, hiring for external audits, community engagement and marketing.
Yield optimizers are decentralized protocols or smart contracts programmed to automatically seek the highest available yields across multiple supported platforms, and then farm, harvest, reinvest the harvest and automatically compound the earnings. When a user provides liquidity into a pool, they earn a share of the trading fees and liquidity provider fees. But what differentiates how Beefy or Autofarm assign those fees and present them from other optimizers and traditional finance?
The answer is transparency. For instance, Beefy charges a 0.1% withdrawal fee on all vaults with the charges placed on the total amount you withdraw, but all other fees are included in their APY calculation. There is also a 3.0% performance fee on all vaults which gets distributed among BIFI holders in the BIFI Maxi pool. Aside from these fees, there are also the blockchain fees that go to blockchain operators. 0.5% of the fees are allocated to the Beefy Finance Treasury, 0.5% is awarded to the Vault Strategist and another 0.5% to the one calling the harvest function. 0.1% is assigned on deposit or withdrawal fees to protect each vault from bad actors. By laying out how the fees are dispersed, the company makes investors feel more secure with paying the fees for the service.
In comparison with traditional finance vehicles, users can get yields at a 14.46% APY with fees factored in with Beefy finance. In other words, $1M invested with Beefy Finance at 14.46% APY yields $57, 492, 639 Million. Meanwhile $1M invested with traditional finance for 30 years at 8% with a 3% management fee fields $4.32 Million.
Now let’s take a look at Autofarm. Their fee break down according to the team includes the following:
Controller Fee
This fee covers the gas cost for the optimized auto-compounding. On BSC, the controller fees cost 0.2% while it costs 0.008% on HECO.
Platform Fee (Treasury)
This fee covers all the varied purposes of the aggregator including running costs. On BSC, platform fees cover just the treasury and cost 0.5% on the other hand, HECO platform fees cover treasury + revenue sharing which cost 0.3% + 1.5% = 1.8%
Vault Fee ($AUTO Buyback & burn)
A percentage of the profit that is taken to buy back $AUTO tokens to be burnt. The tokens burnt will reduce the max supply of $AUTO forever and all $AUTO holders & liquidity providers will benefit. According to Beefy Finance, “The buyback burn rate is as specified in the dropdown of each vault. Currently, all regular vaults have a vault fee of 1.5%, and non-$AUTO earning vaults have a vault fee of 3.0%.”
Vault Fee (Reward $AUTO Stakers)
This Vault fee is only applicable to HECO as the BSC-HECO bridge has not been built and will likely be up in a Month. Vaults from the HECO cross-chain will be used to reward $AUTO stakers who stake their $AUTO tokens on single token vaults on the BSC network and it costs 1.5%.
Deposit Fee
Deposit fees on HECO and BSC cost the same - a one-off fee less than <0.1% on initial capital.
Withdrawal Fee
Withdrawal fees on both HECO and BSC cost 0%.
Beefy Finance is a yield aggregator that allows its users to become yield farmers effortlessly. This definition fits the profile of all yield aggregators. Users do not need to compound their funds periodically as users can just set and leave their funds in yield farming. Utilizing a vault system, Beefy Finance optimizes yields by implementing strategies through smart contracts. The vaults serve as investment instruments automating the best yield farming opportunities. Instead of users regularly making decisions on investments, the vaults perform the following actions: providing assets as collateral for others, utilizing assets as liquidity, using assets to generate a yield and compound profits and reducing liquidation.
With traditional investment vehicles, you can earn a 12.5% annual return on your investment. But with Beefy Finance, your compounding interest and regular interest are added together to give their users a significantly higher overall annual return. So, you get your 12.5% annual compounding interest and 14.2% interest of another site’s promotional coin ( interest on promotional coins from any of the platforms Beefy uses). In total, users get 28.02% APY on Beefy. While traditional finance vehicles come with excess charges some of which are covert, Beefy has made a transparent declaration of all its fees which are directly proportional to when activities occur in your account.
Autofarm is a leading DeFi yield aggregator on BSC and HECO with 3 products Autofarm, Vaults (yield optimizer), AutoSwap (DEX Aggregator), and farmfolio that make up its ecosystem. The yield optimizer implements maximized yields at minimal costs, while AutoSwap allows users to swap or trade through routes that find the best price and swap rates. Farmfol.io users have access to an intelligent portfolio manager and tracker that manages their assets across different DeFi farming projects. All of these services are governed by AUTO token, the platform’s native token.
Unlike traditional finance vehicles, with yield optimizers, fees are transparent and included in the APY minus blockchain fees. Yield optimizers are making fees charged on financial services serve a beneficial purpose for users, giving traditional investment vehicles a run for their money. With an APY of 12% to 14% that users get from yield optimizers fees factored in, more people will begin contemplating their financial future in the hands of a system designed to take more from them than to give in return.
NFTs are witnessing growing speculation among NFT fans, leaving NFTS on track to be a massive industry in the future; collectible assets like CryptoKitties and CryptoPunks have proven the potential in the past.
Since the beginning of the blockchain digital economy, there have been many shifts, trends, and use cases that have accompanied its development. The blockchain’s original utilitarian value was exclusively for financial matters, creating the first-ever cryptocurrency, the Bitcoin, and its issuing blockchain. However, this practical value gets expanded every day. NFTs are one such expansion of possible use case of blockchain technology that has found relevance in gaming, digital identity, licensing, certificates, and fine art.
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are also known as crypto-collectibles. They can not be divided, maintain uniqueness, and characterize scarcity associated with cryptocurrencies, ultimately driving up their value. Also embedded in NFT’s attributes is the ability to represent a unique digital asset, which can be digital assets or tokenized versions of real-world assets. Initially launched on the Ethereum blockchain using the ERC-721 standard, the NFT industries have since expanded into other blockchains, with blockchain companies like WAX becoming the highest issuance of NFTs collectibles currently.
NFTs contain identifying information recorded in their smart contracts. They differ distinctly from regular cryptocurrencies in that each token is indivisible with properties that cant be shared with another tokens. Traditional cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are divisible and are interchangeable, aka, fungible. For example, it is practically impossible to split one NFT collectible into new identities and owners, but entirely possible to do so with Bitcoin. One Bitcoin can change hands over time, and each Bitcoin is the same as the other; what may change with its movement might be the asset’s price.
NFTs have their own specific set of attributes (e.g., off-chain and on-chain metadata), making them unique. This uniqueness means that only one type of NFT can ever be created and it can not be interchanged with an identical one. NFT’s highlight the uniqueness and scarcity of the broader use of blockchain. It has found its increased relevance in the areas of Artwork and Gaming. Since no two artworks are unique with fungible properties in mind, the same principles apply to certain gaming items.
There are various frameworks and issuance of NFTs, the most prominent standard is the ERC-721, which is the first standard created for the distribution of this asset class. A more improved standard is the ERC-1155, which has enabled a contract to store both fungible and non-fungible assets, improving the industry’s convenience and opportunities therein.
Since its creation, WAX blockchain has been focusing heavily on the design, issuance, and profitability of NFT and has been the most active in terms of NFTs transactions. It is displacing Ethereum that initially brought in the NFT craze of 2016, causing a gas war at the time. WAX blockchain improved on the ease of transacting with NFTs, with no traffic congestion nor increased costs to move NFTs. The ease of acquiring NFTs is high when compared to other issuing blockchain types. With a simple creation of an account, transacting in and on NFTs, is enabled automatically.
NFTs can be used by blockchain decentralized applications (Dapp) to issue unique digital assets, identification, and collectibles. Since NFTs trade on the blockchain, you have a lot of freedom regarding what you can use them for:
NFTs help solves high inflation in gaming economies. Since most games have their economy and revenue generation strategies figured out, NFTs bring it a step further by allowing for the unique identification of a game and its features. Another exciting use of NFTs is the tokenization of real-world assets that can be stored and traded on a blockchain-enabled wallet and marketplace, respectively. Keeping digital identity is a use case that NFTs have helped improve tremendously using blockchain’s trustless property.
You don’t discuss NFTs or Blockchain gaming without mentioning the “OG” of them all. The first Cryptokitties collectibles were minted in 2016, which were some of the first non-fungible tokens. Each blockchain-based collectible cat is unique from the other. If you send someone a Cryptokitties collectible, you’ll receive a different collectible that’s distinctly different in properties from the one sent.
Each cryptokitty can have a combination of different properties, including age, breed, and color, as each of them is unique and can not be interchanged with each other. To date, no gas fee era on the Ethereum blockchain has been as high as the days when Cryptokitties was popular.
Many argue that NFTs are not used for their original intended purpose. But more of a speculation asset these days, with high-interest from traders who seek to profit from the high return of NFTs collectibles. With the growing craze, scam rates are increasing as well. Fake arts and artists are becoming commonplace. The idea that art can never be copied is fueling nefarious activities as rug pull cases build up.
NFTs are witnessing growing speculation among NFT fans, leaving NFTS on track to be a massive industry in the future; collectible assets like CryptoKitties and CryptoPunks have proven the potential in the past. However, it shouldn’t be used for its monetary value solely but for its actual use case, which is the basis of its creation. Understandably, traders want to profit, but that, as the sole purpose, won’t do well with the original intention behind NFTs. More blockchains have started issuing their own NFTs; right now, the top two blockchains are Ethereum and the WAX blockchain; the industry awaits other blockchains to begin their issuance. And who knows, we can have NFTs innovate activities like gaming and artwork in the traditional technology.
