Persistence: Building Liquid Staking and Re-staking Infrastructure for the Cosmos Ecosystem

Persistence is one of the first application chains in the Cosmos ecosystem to enable IBC, CosmWasm, and liquid staking modules. By focusing on POS and liquid staking related products, the project has built a complete structure for liquid staking and re-staking in the Cosmos ecosystem.

On December 5, 2023, the Cosmos community voted to allocate 600,000 ATOM for the growth of liquid staking for pSTAKE. In return, pSTAKE will share 15% of the liquid staking revenue with Cosmos Hub.

Persistence Ecosystem Overview

According to official data, the Persistence ecosystem's TVL has reached 14.78 million USD, with an IBC trading volume of 15 million USD in the past 30 days and an average transaction cost of less than 0.005 USD. The data shows that Persistence has established 121 channels with 44 other regions in the Interchain network, demonstrating a high degree of interconnectivity.

74.7% of the tokens in the network ($XPRT) are in a stake state, with an annual yield of 16.7%. This high staking rate usually indicates a higher level of security and participation in the network. The infrastructure of Persistence consists of 6 nodes and 100 validators, which together maintain the decentralization and security of the network.

In the last 24 hours, the IBC trading volume of Persistence reached $260,800, with a total of 4,955 transactions, including 616 IBC transactions. There were 932 active addresses and 86 active IBC addresses. It is noteworthy that the IBC inflow continues to exceed the outflow, indicating that more and more value is flowing into Persistence and participating in stake.

Technical Support

Persistence supports the CosmWasm framework, allowing developers to write secure and interoperable smart contracts using the Rust language. DApps developed based on CosmWasm can run across chains via IBC, providing convenient, secure, and efficient technical support for liquid staking.

The project connects to 54 Cosmos application chains through IBC, enabling trustless communication, transfer, staking, and liquid staking of tokens, laying the ecological foundation for staking and liquid staking in the Cosmos ecosystem. In addition, Persistence also utilizes Interchain Accounts (ICA) to achieve ICA Liquid Staking, enhancing the efficiency and flexibility of staking and liquid staking.

liquid staking

In the Cosmos ecosystem, liquid staking includes two roles: validators and delegators. Stakers (delegators) can choose which validator node to delegate to. Validators are responsible for running hardware and blockchain applications based on the Cosmos SDK, reaching consensus with other validators, and proposing and validating new blocks on the chain.

If a validator exhibits negative behavior, the delegators of its node will face corresponding penalties. For example, if the validator is unexpectedly or maliciously offline continuously, the delegator's stake will be reduced by 0.1%; if the validator exhibits extremely malicious behavior (such as double signing), the stake will be reduced by 5%.

This mechanism prevents malicious behavior through economic incentives and potential penalties, with validators and delegators jointly bearing responsibility to maintain network efficiency and security, while earning token rewards.

pSTAKE stake

pSTAKE provides a streamlined staking process for the Cosmos ecosystem. Users simply need to select the token to stake and the chain to stake on, and they can proceed with the staking. Once the staking is completed, the pSTAKE protocol will issue corresponding staking rights tokens to the user's wallet (for example, staking ATOM to receive stkATOM).

One of the features of pSTAKE is automatic compound interest. Taking stkATOM as an example, the user's daily staking rewards (ATOM) will automatically enter the stake to continue earning rewards. This means that the number of staked ATOM corresponding to each stkATOM will gradually increase, allowing users to receive more ATOM when they unstake.

Users need to wait 21 to 25 days when canceling their stake, or they can pay a 1% fee for a flash unstake. When retrieving the stake, the corresponding stk assets will be destroyed.

pSTAKE currently supports 5 tokens: ATOM from Cosmos Hub, OSMO from the Osmosis chain, DYDX from the dYdX chain, STARS from Stargaze, and HUAHUA from Chihuahua, as well as those minted on the Persistence chain. It is important to note that regardless of which chain's assets are staked, a certain amount of $XPRT is required as GAS fees.

stake derivatives

Persistence and the Cosmos ecosystem have launched more stk asset derivatives. For example, on DEX products, stkATOM can be directly exchanged for ATOM without the need to unstake or pay additional fees. In addition, stk assets can also be combined with native assets to add liquidity on DEX, yielding higher returns.

$XPRT stake

As an independent blockchain, Persistence also requires staking to enhance network security. Users can conveniently stake $XPRT on the official Persistence site or in the Keplr wallet.

stake security

Persistence and pSTAKE are both open-source programs, which is an important guarantee of security. The pSTAKE program involves 72 developers, with the most recent code submission made 2 days ago. Additionally, Persistence and pSTAKE collaborate with multiple security organizations to provide comprehensive support for the security of staking and liquid staking.

Re-staking

Persistence is building Restaking infrastructure in Cosmos, allowing users to deposit liquid staking tokens into Persistence through pSTAKE, Stride, and Quicksilver, thereby restaking assets and securing additional chains while earning extra rewards.

Re-staking Alliance

The re-staking module of Persistence is developed based on the Alliance module, enabling assets to be staked from one blockchain to another, forming a mutually beneficial relationship. The re-staking alliance shares staking rewards, and the stakers of various assets distribute the rewards according to the reward weight of the assets.

Re-staking yield source

The tokens used by users for re-staking will be locked and native tokens will be minted proportionally, which will go into the staking module to be staked to validators in the role of delegators. The staking rewards obtained will be distributed to the original stakers.

Summary

Persistence provides an effective and secure economic infrastructure for liquid staking and re-staking within the Cosmos ecosystem. Through an innovative re-staking program, Persistence establishes an economic alliance for re-stakers, which not only enhances mutual security but also increases the level of decentralization within the re-staking alliance of the Cosmos ecosystem. This series of initiatives is gradually deepening Persistence's influence in the Cosmos ecosystem, bringing higher security, asset liquidity, and participation to the entire ecosystem.