Weekly Project Updates: Starknet to Distribute Over 1.8 Billion STRK, etc

1. Starknet Foundation Announces Plans to Distribute Over 1.8 Billion STRK Tokens link

The Starknet Foundation announces plans to allocate over 1.8 billion STRK tokens to drive the adoption and development of the Starknet chain. The first batch of allocations is set to begin, with the Reserves Committee allocating 900 million STRK for fair, decentralized, and transparent distribution across multiple projects and stages. Additionally, another 900 million STRK will be used to reward users utilizing the network, with specific eligibility criteria yet to be disclosed. Furthermore, 50 million STRK will be allocated for on-chain incentives in the DeFi sector, and an innovative incentive mechanism for developers and dapps will be announced next week.

2. LayerZero: Token Distribution Expected in the First Half of 2024 link

LayerZero Labs has announced via Twitter that the protocol now has a native token. The team expresses its commitment to carefully managing the distribution of the token and anticipates completing this process by the first half of 2024.

3. Taiko Launches $30 Million Second Phase Grant Program, Encompassing Community, Partnerships, and RFP Tracks link

On December 5th, the zkRollup-based Layer2 network, Taiko, announced the launch of its second grant program, Taiko Grants Cycle 2, with a total funding pool of $30 million. The program has expanded to cover projects at various stages of their lifecycle, including the Community, Partners, and Requests for Proposal (RFP) tracks. The Community track is for early-stage projects planning to build on Taiko, currently doing so, or already deployed, and applications are open from now until January 15, 2024. The Partners track is for mature projects or service providers that are already live and wish to integrate, support, or deploy on Taiko, and this will be an ongoing direction with applications staying open even after the second grant cycle ends. The RFP track is for experienced builders or teams with high-impact projects who want to participate in Taiko Labs submissions and will also remain open after the second cycle.

4. Solana On-Chain DEX Records Daily Trading Volume Close to $750 Million, Marking a Significant Historical High link

According to DeFiLlama data, on December 7th, the decentralized exchange (DEX) trading volume on the Solana blockchain reached nearly $750 million, setting a significant new record. Top DEXs on Solana, such as Orca and Raydium, also achieved all-time highs. on December 7th, Solana’s DEX trading volume increased by 67%, surpassing $1 billion, approximately 70.5% of the Ethereum DEX trading volume during the same period.

5. Worldcoin Foundation Unveils $5 Million Community Grant Program link

The Worldcoin Foundation announced a $5 million community funding program called “Wave0” on Wednesday. The initiative aims to enable developers to “focus on building resilient technologies and fairer systems on Worldcoin.” The funding will be provided in the form of WLD tokens and is intended for projects related to the intersection of privacy and biometric technologies within research and development efforts.

6. UniSat Wallet Announces UniSat App Launch in December link

UniSat Wallet has announced that the UniSat App is set to launch in December. Additionally, UniSat will support the Atomicals protocol, expected to go live next week. The UniSat Ordinals Marketplace is now open to the public free of charge for peer-to-peer transactions. The UniSat Indexer is scheduled to open in January 2024 and will be fully open-source, allowing anyone to deploy and run it using the brc20-sats incentive model for mining brc20-sats.

7. Decentralized Trading Platform Hashflow Releases Version 2.0, Expanding to Ethereum L2 and Solana link

Decentralized exchange platform Hashflow has announced the launch of its latest version, Hashflow 2.0, introducing Smart Order Routing (SOR) technology. Hashflow 2.0 initially supports Ethereum and will later expand to Ethereum L2s and Solana. The platform claims that traders can directly trade local assets on Solana while also conducting local cross-chain swaps with ETH/USDC/USDT.

8. Synthetix Founder Kain Warwick Introduces SIP-2043 link

Synthetix founder Kain Warwick has released SIP-2043, proposing the end of the SNX inflation proposal by reducing the weekly SNX inflation rate to zero. He believes that the effectiveness of SNX inflation incentives has significantly decreased, with the inflation rate currently in the low single digits, making it meaningless for stakers.

9. Community Proposes Merger of Osmosis and Umee UX Chain link

On December 4th, MasterFrenchie initiated a community proposal suggesting the merger of the leading DEX Osmosis in Cosmos with the lending protocol Umee UX Chain. UX Chain would transition its code development to the Osmosis blockchain, and both protocols would share TVL. Additionally, as part of the merger, the possibility of token exchange or migration mechanisms between the two will be explored, contingent on community governance, with both initially existing as separate tokens.

10. Jito Labs Releases Airdrop Eligibility and Allocation Specifications, Airdropping 80 Million JTO Tokens to Users link

On December 5th, Solana MEV infrastructure developer Jito Labs published information about the eligibility and distribution specifications for their airdrop. Within the 10% airdrop allocation (1 billion tokens), 15% (15 million tokens) is allocated to Jito-Solana validators, 5% (5 million tokens) to Jito MEV searchers, and 80% (80 million tokens) to JitoSOL users who held at least 100 points before November 25, 2023. Users can currently verify their eligibility by confirming their Solana wallet addresses, and after the airdrop launch, they can initiate the JTO token claiming process on the official website. On December 7th, both Binance and Coinbase announced the listing of the JTO token.