Category: Optimism

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Crypto News Ethereum Optimism

Optimism TVL Rockets 300% Amid Imminent ETH Merge

New data from DefiLlama reveals that Optimism’s total value locked (TVL) has surged by almost 300 percent in the past month.

The Ethereum scaling solution surpassed US$1 billion in TVL ahead of the blockchain’s transition from a proof-of-work to a proof-of-stake network:

https://defillama.com/chain/Optimism
DefiLlama data for Optimism’s TVL.

ETH Merge Optimal for Optimism

Optimism (OP) rose by more than 89 percent in the past week alone, reaching a high of US$2.22 on August 4 and noticeably outperforming most of the market.

The latest price action is likely based on developments surrounding the upcoming Ethereum layer-2 scaling protocol. The protocol will utilise rollups to speed up Ethereum’s transactions, thereby reducing its costs. This week’s value spike has followed an OP Labs announcement that flagged plans for a Bedrock upgrade set to arrive as early as Q4 2022:

Experts believe the Merge upgrade could potentially scale the network to 100,000 transactions per second, with layer-2 solutions further enhancing such capacity. This would represent a massive upgrade from its current 30 transactions per second.

Other developments users can expect to see soon include a 20 percent cut in the cost of data submission to layer 1, support for several alternative proof systems, and an optimised code that will allow nodes to synch 50 times faster.

Two Sides to the Optimism Coin

Optimism has been busy this year on fronts good and bad. In April the company announced its new governance structure and began preparing for the release of its new token, $OP, to help power the changes. The new structure would see governance divided between two houses – the Citizens house and the Token house, to be established via the airdropping of new tokens to users.

However, June brought damages to Optimism in the form of an exploit. The roll-up solution lost US$15 million worth of its new OP tokens after Wintermute, its launch partner, transferred the tokens to the wrong wallet address. Luckily, a white hat attacker returned 17 million tokens (worth approximately US$11 million).

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Crypto News DeFi Ethereum Optimism

‘Optimism’ Hacker Returns 17 Million Tokens Worth $11 Million

Last week, Optimism – a rollup solution for the Ethereum network – lost US$15 million worth of Optimism (OP) tokens after launch partner Wintermute transferred the tokens to the wrong wallet address. On Monday, the attacker returned 17 million OP tokens, worth roughly US$11 million.

Hacker Returns Majority of Funds, Keeps 2M as Bounty

As per a tweet from Optimism, the address returned the majority of funds but kept 2 million tokens as bounty:

Optimism is designed to alleviate congestion on the Ethereum network and provide users with faster and cheaper ERC-20 transactions.

Wintermute is Optimism’s partner and market maker, providing liquidity services. Problems began when Wintermute accidentally sent the wrong address to Optimism’s team. “We made a serious error,” it has since conceded.

Hacker Sends 1M OP Tokens to Ethereum Co-Founder

According to on-chain data, the attacker cashed 1 million OP tokens and then sent 1 million tokens to Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin. The attacker left an on-chain message for Buterin, stating:

Hello, Vitalik, I believe in you, just want to know your opinion on this. BTW, help to verify the return address and I will return the remaining [tokens]. And hello Wintermute, sorry, I only have 18M and this is what I can return. Stay Optimistic!

Etherscan data

The reasons for sending Buterin 1 million OP remain unclear. Crypto Twitter, Wintermute and Optimism are speculating on the possible motives. In a blog post, Wintermute said it might have been the work of a white-hat hacker:

We are open to see this as a white hat exploit. Moreover, the way the attack has been performed has been rather impressive and we can even consider consulting opportunities or other forms of cooperation in future. We are also content with the scenario where the remaining 19 million tokens are returned to Optimism wallet.

Wintermute blog post
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Crypto News DAO Ethereum Optimism Tokens

ETH Scaling Solution ‘Optimism’ Launches DAO, Plans to Airdrop OP Token

Optimism, a leading Ethereum layer 2 scaling solution, has unveiled its new governance structure and is preparing to release a token called OP to help power the change: 

Governance of Two Houses

Optimism’s newly announced governance structure is to be split into two halves: the Citizens house and the Token house. The Citizens house will be governing the distribution of funding for retroactive public goods, whereas the Token house will focus on driving growth, protocol upgrades, and project incentives.

The new governance token, OP, will be the power behind the Token house. It will create incentives for users to contribute to governance, as much of the project’s decisions will be voter-based. This house will be established through a token airdrop to users.

This airdrop will not just be a one-time event, as users can expect a second drop in Q2. While awaiting an official date for the first airdrop, users can find eligibility information and an allocations link within the initial announcement.

Layer 2 and DAOs

Aside from Optimism, there is a wide range of projects working to continue the expansion of the DeFi ecosystem and resolve network performance issues. Crypto News Australia has compiled an informative list of projects worth watching.  

Decentralised autonomous organisations (DAOs) are the blockchain-based version of companies that are native to the internet. There’s a lot to know about DAOs, not to mention a list of risks and benefits, but it doesn’t have to be complicated. Crypto News Australia has also published a handy guide to DAOs.