The Clover blockchain aims to bring cross-chain compatibilities to the DeFi market and will leverage Polkadot’s parachain infrastructure for transferring assets and value across different platforms.
On Tuesday, October 13, cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb Global announced its new open-source blockchain platform Clover powered by the Polkadot (DOT) technology. The Clover blockchain platform functionality specifically caters to the decentralized finance (DeFi) market.
Bithumb said that with Clover, its aim is to connect decentralized finance to centralized exchanges by leveraging cross-chain capabilities. Clover rests atop Polkadot’s custom blockchain framework Substrate. Bithumb said that it plans to launch Polkadot directly as a ‘parachain’ on Substrate, the term that refers to specialized shards on Polkadot. All the parachains linked to the Polkadot network serve as sovereign layer-one blockchains.
Clover will also have its native cryptocurrency dubbed CLV which will work as both – utility token and governance token. The CLV tokens will have multiple roles like transactions on different marketplaces as well as staking and consensus. Besides, CLV token owners can also participate in governance-related matters as well as earn dividends from the platform. The community of CLV token owners can also vote for changes to the Clover blockchain.
Speaking to Cointelegraph, Clover CEO Chris Li said:
“Bithumb will be the major supporter for Clover, and we plan to use Bithumb as a custodian solution for cross-chain transactions before Polkadot decentralized solutions become available”.
However, he adds that unlike Binance, Bithumb won’t have much influence on the parachains. Li noted that the company is also planning to work with outside partners and exchanges. Thus, they would like to keep the operations decentralized to the extent possible.
Essential Elements of the Clover Chain
The Clover CEO said that the blockchain will have some in-house decentralized application (DApps) consisting of different types of wallets, lending protocols, and a decentralized exchange. Bithumb will also encourage and support other projects building atop Clover.
According to Li, the next big challenge in front of the DeFi market is “transferring assets and value across different platforms”. Thus, Bithumb will work towards new advances in DeFi while simultaneously contributing to the Polkadot ecosystem. At the same time, Bithumb will work on expanding its own ecosystem.
Last week itself, Polkadot announced its Initial Parachian Offering (IPO) that aims to fund different crypto projects by replacing the traditional financial instruments. Clover will launch as a parachain. However, this depends once Polkadot starts auctioning its parachain slots.
Giving a tentative estimate, Li said: “But we expect to integrate into the Polkadot network in Q1 2021”. He acknowledged that the support from Polkadot was crucial in launching its own custom blockchain.
next