July has been yet another month of growth and innovation for the Stacks ecosystem. Here’s our recap of the most exciting developments. ☀️
TL;DR
- Stacks’ latest quarterly growth metrics are all trending up 🚀
- Hyperchains, mining, NFTs: The ecosystem is brimming with new ideas
- We’ve got a selection of podcasts and Twitter accounts to stay in the loop
Growth metrics
Here’s what Stacks’ quarterly growth metrics looked like as of July 10:
- STX addresses: 444,490 (up from 417k last quarter)
- Smart contracts: 5,127 (up from 3,235)
- TVL: $524M (up from $478M)
- BTC rewards earned: 1770 (up from 1127)
- Entities: 72 (up from 45)
Ecosystem updates
Behind the growth numbers, here are some of the development highlights:
- Hyperchains. Stacks Hyperchains are live on TestNet. Hyperchains are a scaling solution to significantly increase throughput and reduce latency, allowing for more real-time applications, such as NFT auctions and minting as well as improvements for DEXs and video games. Mainnet launch remains slated for Q1 2023.
- Stablecoins. Wrapped USDC (xUSD) comes to ALEX, a DeFi on Bitcoin solution built on Stacks. xUSD joins Arkadiko’s soft-pegged stablecoin USDA as part of the Stacks DEFI ecosystem.
- Mining. MattySTX, Tokenomics Resident at the Stacks Foundation, released a detailed and information-packed Stacks mining report.
- NFTs. Gamma.io, a Bitcoin NFT platform, released another major creator-focused update.
- DeFi. Arkadiko published a great Summer Update. Through Arkdiko’s “Borrow” feature, users can use STX to mint USDA, a soft-pegged stablecoin, through an overcollaterized loan. The STX collateral can then be locked for three cycles to earn more STX via the Proof of Transfer (PoX) mechanism.
Keeping up with Stacks
Stacks moves fast but Twitter is one of the best ways to keep up. Here’s some great accounts to follow:
- Muneeb and Ryan Shea, the co-founders of Stacks
- Stacks and StacksOrg (The Stacks Foundation)
- Brittany Laughlin, Stacks Ventures, and Trevor (TO)
Podcasts can also be fantastic learning resources:
- The Stacker Chats conversations between Muneeb and Gina Abrams are excellent. In their most recent pod, they talked about where Stacks is headed for the remainder of 2022. 👀
- JakeBlockchain’s Built on Bitcoin podcast is 78 episodes deep and has a regular “This week in Stacks” format – a great way to stay on top of Stacks news.
We are also monitoring the Stacks ecosystem and crypto in general from our Twitter handle so follow us to stay in the loop.
