The long-awaited Stellar - Polygon token bridge, developed by NewsCrypto, is now live on mainnet and has integrated Chainlink Proof of Reserve to help ensure the highest possible standard of security. The bridge gives all XLM holders the ability to swap their tokens from the native Stellar blockchain over to Polygon—the full-stack Ethereum scaling solution with a rapidly growing DeFi ecosystem.
The bridge also provides Polygon users the opportunity to have exposure to XLM without having to go to a different blockchain. When a user swaps their XLM tokens to Polygon, they receive wrapped XLM (wXLM) tokens, which can always be redeemed for the native version on Stellar via the bridge. Given that both chains have very low gas fees, the swap fee is only 5 XLM regardless of the wrapped amount. The swap fee covers the transaction costs for the smart contract and the Chainlink Proof of Reserve feed.
Supported by a Polygon development grant, the bridge has been in development for some time now, and the public testnet version went live in early October. Now, with all the optimizations implemented and thoroughly tested, the bridge is ready to open the door for billions of dollars of liquidity on Stellar to access all that Polygon’s DeFi ecosystem has to offer. Security is absolutely essential when it comes to any cross-chain solution, and that’s why NewsCrypto implemented Chainlink Proof of Reserve to make sure that the balances and transactions are constantly synced up. This way, even if the data flow of the bridge itself is somehow compromised, the relevant data is always backed up by an independent Chainlink oracle solution on Stellar.
Our Chainlink Proof of Reserve implementation leverages Chainlink Keepers and Chainlink’s Any API functionality to regularly check the wallet storing XLM on the Stellar blockchain. Chainlink Keepers will continually write the updated balance to a smart contract on Polygon when bridge transactions are made. As a result, users and applications can verify that wXLM is backed 1-to-1 by XLM stored on the Stellar blockchain. Importantly, the Chainlink Keeper solution is decentralized and performed by the same professional node operators that actively help secure tens of billions of dollars across DeFi.
Although there are some similarities between Stellar and Polygon in that both have extremely fast and cheap transactions, the two chains have very different use cases. Stellar is mainly built to optimize for cross-border value transfer for institutions and everyday users while Polygon makes EVM-based DeFi protocols accessible for everyone. With the bridge, users can still hold on to their XLM tokens and use them on any Polygon dApp that they choose while DeFi users that are used to an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) environment can trade XLM without having to move to a different chain. All this, however, is only the first step of NewsCrypto’s development on Polygon and the associated Chainlink integrations. The team is already hard at work on an innovative DeFi protocol of our own, so be sure to stay up to date on their social media pages!
About Chainlink
Chainlink is the industry standard for building, accessing, and selling oracle services needed to power hybrid smart contracts on any blockchain. Chainlink oracle networks provide smart contracts with a way to reliably connect to any external API and leverage secure off-chain computations for enabling feature-rich applications. Chainlink currently secures tens of billions of dollars across DeFi, insurance, gaming, and other major industries, and offers global enterprises and leading data providers a universal gateway to all blockchains.
Learn more about Chainlink by visiting chain.link or read the documentation at docs.chain.link. To discuss an integration, reach out to an expert.
About NewsCrypto
NewsCrypto is an all-in-one trading ecosystem that is primarily focused on education, giving both beginners and expert traders alike everything they need to step into the world of crypto and take their skills to the next level. Recently, the project has expanded to providing novel solutions for DeFi in partnership with different protocols and development-focused projects.
