Thread by @SandorReport

I am such an ethhead but I've spent this weekend exploring #DeFi outside #Ethereum. I was pretty much blown away. If you don't look elsewhere, you are likely missing out, so let me give you a rundown from a power user perspective (so not as a developer etc).

First, I tried the @terra_money ecosystem. They have a protocol coin, $LUNA, that's also like $MKR, underpinning their stablecoins, $UST, $KRT, etc. These stablecoins are actually kinda large now and good at maintaining parity. Not so interesting, right? Wrong.

The game-changer here is @mirror_protocol, which is basically a Synthetix on Terra, using $UST. It works beautifully and it's _almost_ there. You can buy synthetic shares (MSTF, AAPL, etc) and commodities with almost no fee and good slippage. The issue is that there is a premium

on these assets compared to their real-world counterpart. The reasons are complicated, but these should disappear soon. I think the next big thing for Terra would be Mirror adding synthetic $BTC and $ETH. Again, imagine a Synthetix that's actually worth using (gas fees khm).

Terra is also rolling out @anchor_protocol soon, a money market, borrowing / lending, and I expect it to be really big. Plus there's Terraswap (terraswap.io), a Uniswap clone, that can only do $UST / $LUNA now, but the tech is there. It needs more assets.

I am hyper bullish on @terra_money / $LUNA, as everything is coming together beautifully. Stablecoins, real-world use ($KRT is actually used in Korea!), synthetics, money market, everything. The actual user experience can be confusing, though, and they need to fix this:

the stablecoins are "inter-blockchain". $UST lives as a Terra token but also as an ERC20 (it's even on Uniswap!). But you can't buy ERC20 $UST on Uniswap and buy synthetic $MSFT because Mirror is using Terra tokens and not Ethereum tokens... you get the idea.

Terra announced a bridge called Dropship, but it's not here yet, and it's badly needed. The just-launched #Solana <-> #Ethereum bridge will also add Terra tokens in a week or two, so that's great (more on this later). On to the next one: @BinanceChain!

So @binance is obviously huge. But how big is the #DeFi ecosystem around it? Well, much larger than you think. And it's actually usable. Even more, I've found possibly the best deal on @BinanceChain, so let's get into it.

Before the positives, I have to say that the Binance decentralized ecosystem is *confusing as hell*, because of the Binance Chain / Binance Smart Chain thing. The first is a #Tendermint chain, the second is basically #Ethereum on Binance. I think they should rename BSC!

To interact with the Binance Chain ecosystem, you need a Chrome extension wallet called Binance Smart Chain wallet. I know 😜 (or @TrustWalletApp works beautifully, too). So what can you do there? Well, first, there's Binance DEX. It's great UX, what you expect. Fast and cheap.

The problem is liquidity. It is somewhat acceptable on the main pairs, but spread is a huge issue. Yet, if you are patient, you can actually trade reasonable amounts of $BTC, $ETH, $BNB, and stablecoins. Did I say BTC? I meant $BTCB. What's that, you ask?

That's Binance Chain-wrapped #Bitcoin, pegged. And there's Binance Bridge (binance.org/en/bridge) which is really good, converting between BTC <-> BTCB and so on. Or between ERC20 $BUSD and BEP2 $BUSD (BEP2 = Binance Chain token). It's a pleasure to use.

But *why* would you use it? And this brings me to the best deal I've found in #DeFi: @hard_protocol, which is built on @kava_labs, which is interoperable with @BinanceChain as they are both on Tendermint / Cosmos. With Hard Protocol, you can earn a whopping 60% yield. Yup.

~55% yield on $BTC (BTCB) and ~60% yield on $BUSD. It is paid in $HARD tokens (so that's a risk), and the caveat is the lockup period. You can get these yields if you vest your $HARD for a year. Or you can do a month, getting 1/3 of these yields. But your capital is not locked!

If you just swing trade $BTC, it makes little sense NOT to do it on Binance / Binance Chain, and immediately deposit to Hard Protocol, earning these yields. It's a pretty sweet deal if you ask me. Of course, smart contract risks, etc, so just careful.

Next: @ProjectSerum, @solana, and @bonfida. I love the idea. But how good is it in practice? Well, it's getting there, but you need to jump through a lot of hoops. First, the wallet issue. There are no good wallets for Solana-based assets, period.

Sollet is very barebones and @Solongwallet, the MetaMask equivalent, is simply not there yet in terms of UX. Worse, no good mobile wallets exists. You literally can't trade on mobile, and that's a big issue (for me at least). Moreover, @solana has some quirks that are *confusing*

First, if you are an ethead, you know you can send any ERC20 to your Ethereum address. In Solana, all your assets get a separate address. Worse, *one asset can have multiple addresses* and wallets normally only see one of them. And that's bad!

Imagine you have $100 SPL USDC on one address and $100 SPL USDC on the other one. They are under the same account! You have $200! But @Solongwallet only sees $100 and @Oxygen_protocol's mobile wallet only the other $100. Scary, bad UX. Thankfully @bonfida sees both...

So can you trade only on @ProjectSerum / @bonfida? Well you kinda can. Liquidity is amazing. Spreads, though, man, those can be terrible (see the chart). If you only do limit orders and swing trades, you can do it, though.

That's it for now. Decentralized finance outside of #Ethereum is a thing. It's much much bigger and better than I realized, and this makes me very excited. And imagine when the first @Polkadot #DeFi products come out... we are in for a good ride :)

Feedback on Telegram. @cz_binance I beg you, please fix this :)