New version — Flash Trade on swaps.io (demo)
With the blockchain ecosystem growing each day, connecting all its parts together in an efficient manner may sometimes seem less attainable than ever. A lack of interoperability and robust connections between chains negatively affect the trading process, driving big groups of people away from DeFi and its opportunities. However, it is not the only challenge met in the cross-chain space. In this short interview, Kinetex co-founders Tigran Bolshoi and Mike Shishko discuss the biggest cross-chain problems and how Kinetex can help to overcome them.
Apart from the lack of interoperability, which cross-chain developments try to solve, cross-chain technologies themselves are struggling with three challenges: security, user experience or accessibility, and disadvantageous swap conditions. The first challenge is ensuring sufficient security, which is vital to the success of any blockchain system or solution. "One of the factors that comes up when talking about the security of cross-chain is the use of cross-chain bridges and associated attacks on their validators and pools," — Bolshoi states. When linked through bridges, blockchains interconnected in such a way may become vulnerable to hacker attacks, including the infinite mint attack.
The history of bridge attacks, which we could observe in the last years, supports the rationality of such a fear. Bolshoi continues, "Another security weakness is validators. An attack known as "validator takeover" can occur when bridges depend on validators to vote on the approval of transfers. In this scenario, hackers may take control of the majority of network nodes and approve malicious transfers, which could result in significant losses." In order to overcome security risks, the Kinetex team is taking a new method in its upcoming Flash Trade solution. Shishko explains, "We eliminated the use of validators completely in Flash Trade. Instead, we created an innovative approach that uses intents and resolvers, enabling secure, fast, and advantageous cross-chain swaps between users and market makers."
The second problem the team aims to get rid of is users' struggles connected to complex and poorly designed processes and interfaces. "Arguably, complicated interfaces scared away even more users than any security issues they could have known of." — says Shishko. Moreover, the process of swapping assets itself, which has a multitude of steps, does not help the popularization of DeFi either. "Changing wallets, remembering all passwords, analyzing the market, examining possible fees and gas costs, building the most optimal route in case multiple swaps are needed — all these steps that users have to go through when swapping cross-chain have a devastating effect on the efficiency of cross-chain swaps as well as on the popularity of crypto," — Bolshoi states.
Kinetex's solution to a lack of user-friendliness is the Kinetex dApp, built to be as intuitive as possible. Shishko says, "The dApp offers two modes, Liquidity Aggregation, which is available right now, and Flash Trade, which will be launched soon." Both of these modes are designed to be user-friendly and efficient. He continues, "The Liquidity Aggregation mode offers automation, advanced route building, and gasless flow, which makes the swapping process seamless and easy. The Flash Trade mode provides a totally effortless user experience thanks to its architecture, empowering users to outsource choosing the optimal swap parameters and conditions to resolvers". As a result, users can expect a smooth and enjoyable experience trading via both modes.
The last struggle when trading cross-chain is overcoming adverse market conditions and navigating all fees, commissions, and other trading aspects that can influence the result of each trade. Bolshoi explains, "For every data transfer in each network, users have to pay for gas, together with fees and commissions for liquidity providers, validators, smart contracts, bridges, DEXes, etc. Along with these charges, users must factor in other elements affecting rates, such as slippage and price impact. All of these can be very overwhelming even for experienced crypto users, not to mention newcomers to the industry." Shishko adds, "Intent approach helps to overcome those difficulties, substantially streamlining the process for users to a single task of making an order. The rest is on the experienced resolvers to figure out."
Kinetex Network: Website | Kinetex dApp
