Blocks Of Mars

Many blockchain networks have made creating your first stablecoin dApp more complicated than it needs to be. The @Plasma network is making sure that when you try out your first Plasma dApp, it will be very similar to creating a new Git Repository (i.e. Set up the environment for the project) - opinionated about the design, well-documented and very quick to go from an idea to a functioning application on the Plasma blockchain (on-chain). This article offers a clear practical guide to getting from "nothing" to "hello, USDT" on the Plasma Testnet, with everything being provided by $XPL (Plasma's native token).
To begin creating your first dApp, you must first prepare your development tools and environment. This includes creating a Hardhat project, installing the hardhat toolbox, and setting your hardhat.config file to point to the @Plasma Testnet RPC (e.g. https://testnet-rpc.plasma.to or an endpoint from QuickNode, Chainstack or dRPC) for the Plasma Testnet (where you will be using the Plasma Smart Contract(s) deployed on this Testnet). Be sure to set the chainId to "9746" and create an environment variable file (.env) to load your deployer's private key, this will prevent your secret key from being uploaded to version control. Once developed, add the Plasma Testnet to your wallet (e.g. MetaMask or Rabby) using the "official parameters" (i.e. Network name, RPC URL, etc.) that were outlined in this article. When the wallet is connected to @Plasma , it will work seamlessly like other EVM-compatible networks.
After you have set up your network and created an account at one of the supported Faucets, you can start using your gas. Request Testnet XPL to the address that you will be using to deploy your contracts. In just a few seconds, you will see $XPL in your wallet and you can use it to pay for deploying contracts and testing transfers. Your end users will eventually pay for their transfers using stable coins via custom gas tokens; however, for now, treat the experience of deploying contracts and testing transactions as a "sandbox" where you can spam transactions, break flows, and iterate all without risking any real money.
As a first step, design the simplest stablecoin-native contract that you can deploy. For example: a “Paywall” or allowance manager for a USDT-like Token deployed on the @Plasma network. Because the Plasma network is fully EVM-compatible, it is possible to create a standard open-source Solidity contract that interacts with ERC-20 Tokens via functions such as payment acceptance, balance tracking, and fee routing to a treasury. Use npx hardhat compile to compile the contract; correct any warnings displayed; confirm that you have included safe Math and access Control libraries in your contract as you are building upon the infrastructure of payments and not simply creating a toy-chain.

To deploy your dApp, you will need only one script. First, set up a new script at scripts/deploy.js (or deploy.ts), connect your plasmaTestnet.ts signer from Hardhat, and deploy your smart-contract; Hardhat will give you an address that will be the dApp’s on-chain home (hexadecimal like 0x...). Copy the address into your .env file for the frontend or use a config file, and immediately test it with your browser wallet. Send some test USDT to the address, confirm that the transaction is final in the block explorer, and run a load test on it. If you want the most natural user experience possible, you may want to add @Plasma 's stablecoin patterns (zero fee) for USDT transfers through protocol paymasters and custom gas tokens so that your users will not have to worry about “I need gas before I can pay.”
Once you’re ready for production, you can start by connecting to an existing RPC service or create your own. Some examples of leading RPC providers are Chainstack and QuickNode. You can use these RPC providers’ services to give your application higher uptime, separate your read traffic from your transaction broadcasting, and monitor your usage metrics remotely. Each of these tools gives you information about failed transactions, time taken to confirm transactions, and the cost per user action, as you build the final version of your application. $XPL serves as the underlying support for everything: paying gas fees, rewarding validators for securing the state transitions, and maintaining consistency in the changes made by your application.
Unlike other chains that call themselves “multi-purpose," @Plasma has been built specifically for developers that want to create a payment application where users can feel comfortable using their stablecoin; eventually using Bitcoin as a payment method in the same manner they would use a dollar today. With a straightforward Hardhat setup, proven, well-established RPC partners, easy access to testnet faucets, and developer-friendly, stablecoin-centric primitives, you can take a prototype created on your local machine and turn it into a payment product in a way where you don’t have to change your way of thinking. Builders that release products using @Plasma today will be the ones defining how upcoming generations experience the cryptocurrency payment process compared to yield farming methods that they see now. #plasma

While many chains appear as loosely connected modules, @Plasma utilizes an architectural process similar to building a single payment engine with a triad of synchronized pistons - consensus, execution, and bridging. Collectively, these pistons create instant, irrevocable, programmable currencies with the utilization of stablecoins and Bitcoin liquidity (as a result) on the Plasma support network.
At the base layer of @Plasma is PlasmaBFT, a pipelined Fast HotStuff-based consensus mechanism that takes blocks and sequences them with a deterministic finality. Unlike conventional approaches which treat the proposal, voting and committing processes as separate, sequential stages, Plasma allows "x" number of proposals to travel through the pipeline in parallel with others being completed. Committees on the Plasma network are selected randomly from the validator population using a stake-weighted algorithm, which enables an efficient and low overhead method of selecting committee members while maintaining Byzantine Fault Tolerance (for networks that contain a maximum of 1/3 of faulty nodes) - a necessity for a payment network that cannot afford to have frequent reorganizations.
While the execution layer is a Reth-based EVM client built in Rust, it is also powered by Reth, which is responsible for the balance of the contract and how it interacts with the rest of the system. For example, if a transaction sends money from an account to a vendor, Reth would identify the transaction as sending money from one account and debiting it from the other account. Similarly, Reth would also recognize that some of the money that was debited from one account has been distributed to multiple vendors/parties, and would update the inventory of pBTC vaults accordingly. The Engine API serves as the bridge between Willow's functionality and Reth's functionality, by exporting ordered payloads and Quality Confirmations from PlasmaBFT and returning state roots and execution results from Reth to allow builders to utilize standard Solidity and tools such as Hardhat and MetaMask, without having to create a custom VM. However, builders who wish to utilize USD-pegged stablecoins as part of their applications will need to understand that the USD-pegged stablecoins will be native to the protocol as those features are embedded into the protocol.

The third 'piston' of the engine is Bridging. Bitcoin is at the center of all bridges that are trust-minimized, and trusted bridges to other blockchain technologies will also exist. Plasma uses a trust-minimized model to bridge deposits of Bitcoin by verifying those deposits using independent observers, and then creating pBTC tokens within the EVM environment. The pBTC tokens live in the same state machine as the USD-pegged stablecoins; therefore, smart contracts will be able to route transaction flows between both types of tokens and facilitate the use of pBTC without the need for a third-party custodian. Examples include the use of pBTC to collateralize loans, to pay salaries, or to provide liquidity to USDT rails. Future cross-blockchain connector and Oracle features will also plug into the same architecture to provide the Consensus Layer with a single view of all bridged assets, rather than several disparate side-systems.
$XPL is the asset that facilitates coordination between the three layers of the network to incentivize participants to behave honestly as validators staking XPL earn rewards and pay fees for their performance. Users pay with a variety of custom gas tokens (e.g., USD₮, pBTC) but all gas settlements are in XPL. As the volume of stablecoins and BTC increases, so does the number of transactions through the Reth engines, which will convert and burn gas fees, and ultimately route more value through the XPL‑secure consensus layer. Therefore, a direct correlation exists between the usage of stablecoins (digital dollars) and BTC and the economic infrastructure on the network.
Plasma is not just another L1 stack diagram; it is a blueprint for achieving specific outcomes as follows: to create a digital dollar and BTC experience similar to Web2 digital money but with the unique advantage of being fully "crypto-native". Consensus acknowledges instant, final ordering; execution turns that ordered sequence into state changes for digitally denominated dollars, and bridging creates deep liquidity in that same area. At the intersection of the three layers is the $XPL settlement layer that combines incentives, security, and user experience in a single flywheel—allowing Plasma to compete with the current banking rail and card network solutions for global stablecoin payment processing. #plasma

$XPL is the ticker that most people see, but XPL is better described as the foundation of @Plasma ’s economy where users can use the stablecoin and have payment stability without speculation overwhelming payment use cases. Unlike the majority of tokens, the primary purpose of any XPL is to deliver consensus sequencing to the rest of its ecosystem. Its purpose is further outlined through the remaining functions of the token, which are to bootstrap applications and reward those who support the overall infrastructure required for digital dollar systems to function.
The initial supply of $XPL will start with a total supply of 10 billion; any increase in supply will be determined mostly by validator rewards as opposed to the introduction of new minted coins. The majority of the distribution will focus on building up its ecosystem to encourage the use of the coins, with 40% going toward ecosystem/incentives, 25% allocated to the founding team, 25% given to investors and partners, and approximately 10% going toward public sales. This structure establishes a strong incentive for the key contributors of the token to continue participating as well as the ability to utilize a large portion of the coin's allocation for building liquidity programs and rewarding consumers that are responsible for driving the stablecoin volume throughout the entire plasma network.

In the process of Vesting, the “Deep-Dive” into your Financial Plan is where the “deep dive” really takes place! Team and investor allocations generally have a one-year cliff period where they will not have access to the allocated amount of assets, and then after that one-year cliff period, allocations will typically unlock linearly over approximately a two-year period – meaning that it will take multiple cycles of product launch and adoption before insiders can receive their full allocation. Public sale allocations for certain jurisdictions typically receive a more conservative treatment, with U.S participants generally having a longer lock-up period of roughly one year, while non-U.S allocations will unlock at an earlier time and allow for a more gradual increase of circulating supply rather than a flood of circulating supply at the TGE. The effect of this is that the total number of assets that sit liquid on the first day of launch will only be a relatively small percentage of the total 10 billion assets, which, in turn, reduces the early “reflexive” selling pressure and allows for greater price discovery to occur organically.
At the same time, the XpressLiquid protocol links the network’s security with long-term planning for inflation. When the XpressPro protocol is fully operational and external validators and delegation are live, the protocol will issue 5% annual XpressToken inflation, and it will taper off 0.5% per year until reaching a long-term baseline of 3% inflation. New tokens issued via XpressToken inflation are distributed to stakers through validators. In addition to having a more stable presence in the market when compared to other projects who take a more traditional approach to staking, the “Reward Slash, Not Stake Slash” feature of XpressLiquid protects stakers by removing any future rewards when slashing by punishing the misbehavior of a staker rather than seizing the principal amount of a staker’s assets, making this model more attractive to institutions that desire strong security.
@Plasma has incorporated a fee-burning system that operates similarly to EIP-1559 to combat the effects of pure inflation. By burning a part of every transaction fee, there is now a tug-of-war occurring as a result of the issuance of Plasma token (XPL) going to the stakers and the reduction of the overall supply of Plasma token (XPL) through on-chain activity. As the amount of stablecoin and pBTC being traded continues to grow, so does the number of $XPL tokens that are destroyed; therefore, this results in the effective supply curve being moved closer towards neutral and perhaps even deflationary in times of high usage. This also creates a direct alignment of interests among the three key stakeholders (users who desire low fees and a reliable transaction medium; validators who want to be rewarded in a sustainable manner; and holders who can benefit from the increased use of Plasma token and the discipline placed on the supply curve).
This means that by combining security, UX, and growth into one token (XPL), there is the potential for the creation of a stable ecosystem. Validators receive rewards in the form of fees for validating transactions, there are gas fees paid by users even if they use USD₮ or BTC to pay gas fees, and XPL aids in attracting merchants, wallets, and fintechs into the ecosystem. There is a growing market for stablecoins and as such, @Plasma is attempting to make XPL a long-term hold, unlike most L1 tokens which are highly volatile. For those who are following the evolution of digital-dollar infrastructure, the alignment between tokenomics and real-world consumption/use is very important to understand and study closely. #plasma

In general, most of the time when people write smart contracts, they have the needs of speculators in mind. The @Plasma project asks what would happen to smart contracts if they were designed specifically for people who simply want to send dollars as easily as sending a message. The Plasma ecosystem is designed to allow for "stablecoin-native" contracts to easily connect with zero-fee USD₮ transactions and custom gas tokens; thus, changing the UX (user experience) of sending dollars and how developers design their applications.
The primary pattern for the @Plasma ecosystem is that the user doesn't have to pay for sending USD₮ via gas: the gas payment is delegated to a protocol level paymaster. Instead of forcing users to have a balance in $XPL to cover the gas costs of sending USD₮, the application can instead use the stablecoin-native contracts directly so that the user incurs no cost at the point of sending the money. The paymaster, which is funded and rate limited through the protocol level, compensates the application in gas ($XPL ) after the fact, when there is an actual transfer of funds. Since the actual gas subsidy is visible on-chain, this pattern works perfectly for remittance apps, tipping systems, and other use cases where a single gas transaction can deter conversion.

Another option is to create gas tokens so that they do not require Ethereum gas fees. In addition, a Plasma dApp may allow users to pay for transactions using any approved ERC20 tokens, including stablecoins like USDT and pBTC. The Plasma Paymaster, which uses oracle price feeds to convert approved ERC20 tokens into $XPL , would do this conversion automatically. The developer simply integrates the standard paymaster interface into the Plasma dApp to allow users to request approval for the paymaster and submit a transaction. All of the other processes remain transparent to the user. By enabling users to transact without knowing the gas calculations involved, merchants can price all of their products in US dollars, BTC vaults can operate on a completely Bitcoin-backed basis, and users can maintain ownership of assets while still allowing them to be used as collateral to facilitate other transactions.
The third kind of flows fall into smart-account centric flows. Since Plasma's contracts related to stablecoins are EVM compatible and also built specifically to work with EIP-4337/7702 style Account Abstraction, it provides an opportunity for developers to bundle multiple actions into one single action i.e., signing once to pay a merchant, stream yield and update allowance with either gas assigned or paid via a Stablecoin. This means that it would be very practical for them to build out Web2 grade checkout experiences, Subscription rails and Payroll systems on-chain without any of the challenges related to educating users on “What is Gas?” Ultimately, through time as deeper integration occurs between these Contracts and the Execution Layer (i.e., prioritized inclusion and Protocol incentives) they will become a collective Public Good, instead of a custom infrastructure that each team had to build on their own.
The central concept of the Plasma model is shifting optimization efforts from "How do we squeeze more MEV out of blockspace" to "How do we get rid of all the UX friction that surrounds digital dollars?" $XPL serves as the connection between the two elements: providing a method for achieving consensus and settling gas fees even for users that never interact with it directly. For builders, those three factors (gasless transactions; gas tokens that are created by users; and protocol-managed stablecoins) enable builders to create products that use stablecoins as though they were real fiat currencies or native assets, rather than something awkward and foreign that was created in a virtual environment by someone else. This is the paradigm for the future of payments, DeFi, and fintech that Plasma is creating, and @Plasma is providing an opportunity for all the new innovators in these spaces to create what will be the next wave of innovation. #plasma

Wenn Menschen von "digitalen Dollar" hören, denken viele Menschen an nur eine Sache, aber es gibt tatsächlich drei sehr unterschiedliche Formen von "digitalen Dollar", die den Menschen zur Verfügung stehen: Bankgeld, digitale Zentralbankwährungen (CBDCs) und Stablecoins, die auf öffentlichen Blockchains basieren. Die Analyse des Grundes für die Präferenz von @Plasma für offene, genehmigungsfreie Stablecoins beginnt mit dem Verständnis des einzigartigen Kontrollniveaus, das einem Benutzer in jeder der drei Formen von digitalen Dollar gegeben (oder untersagt) wird.
Bankgeld: Bankgeld repräsentiert Geld, das auf einem Girokonto einer Geschäftsbank gehalten wird. Die tatsächliche Darstellung von Bankgeld erfolgt durch IOUs in einem geschlossenen Hauptbuch, das der Bank gehört. Die Einrichtung von Bankgeld durch ein Netzwerk von Kreditkartenverbänden und Banken verleiht ihm sehr einzigartige Eigenschaften. Neben der Stabilität, Regulierung und Integration in die Wirtschaft ist Bankgeld auch relativ langsam, da geografische Zeitzonen und mehrere Zwischenbanken, die an grenzüberschreitenden Überweisungen beteiligt sind, die Bewegung von Geld für Tage oder länger stören und verzögern können. Typische Nutzer von Bankgeld tragen alle Kosten, die mit den Einschränkungen und Kontrollstrukturen des Bankensystems verbunden sind, das seit dem letzten Jahrhundert existiert.

Menschen denken normalerweise nicht an Konsens. Sie wollen einfach, dass ihr Geld schnell bewegt wird und nicht zurückgeht. PlasmaBFT ist das, was dies für Stablecoins auf @Plasma ermöglicht. Es ist wie ein Motor, den man nicht sehen kann. PlasmaBFT wurde entwickelt, um schnell zu arbeiten, und es verwendet Rust, um Fast HotStuff BFT zu implementieren. Von Anfang an wurde PlasmaBFT dafür gemacht, eine Sache zu tun: sicherzustellen, dass digitale Dollar- und Bitcoin-Transaktionen in Sekunden abgeschlossen werden. Dies muss in einem größeren Maßstab geschehen, und es muss sicher sein. PlasmaBFT wird für Stablecoins auf @Plasma verwendet. Es stellt sicher, dass Transaktionen sicher und schnell sind.

Die meisten Blockchains betrachten Stablecoins als einen weiteren Token. @Plasma handelt anders. Es ist eine Schicht, in der Stablecoins wie Dollar die wichtigste Rolle spielen, nicht etwas Nebensächliches. Stablecoins werden jetzt viel verwendet, fast so viel wie Kartennetzwerke, aber sie müssen auf alten Systemen arbeiten, die langsam und teuer sind. @Plasma möchte die Schicht sein, die Stablecoins wie Dollar hilft, weltweit besser und schneller zu arbeiten. Plasma dreht sich um Stablecoins; es ist eine stablecoin-native Schicht, und es denkt, dass digitale Dollars im Mittelpunkt stehen sollten, daher versucht es, das fehlende Puzzlestück zu sein, das digitale Dollars reibungslos funktionieren lässt.

@Dusk ’s Fokus auf europäische Wertpapiere und regulierte Märkte ist kein nachträglicher Marketing-Gedanke; er ist das Ergebnis mehrerer Jahre, in denen das Team beobachtet hat, wie EU-Vorschriften, Datenschutzgesetze und die Struktur des Kapitalmarktes aufeinandertreffen – und dann eine Kette gebaut hat, die genau dieser Realität entspricht. Die Zusammenarbeit mit der niederländischen Börse NPEX und die Arbeit rund um EU-Vorschriften wie MiCA zeigen, wie bewusst @Dusk sich in der regulierten europäischen Wertpapierlandschaft verankert hat.
Europa: strenge Regeln, große Gelegenheit
Die Europäische Union führt einige der umfassendsten Krypto- und Digital-Asset-Vorschriften der Welt ein, darunter MiCA und Reise-Regel-ähnliche Anforderungen, die Börsen und Wallet-Anbieter dazu verpflichten, Identitäten und transaktionsbezogene Metadaten zu erfassen. Gleichzeitig haben durchgesickerte Vorschläge „Anonymität verbessern-Coins“ ins Visier genommen, was es Institutionen erschwert, klassische Privacy-Coin-Assets zu halten oder mit ihnen zu interagieren, ohne die EU-Vorschriften zu verletzen. Das Team von @Dusk erkannte früh, dass, wenn Blockchains jemals ernsthafte Wertpapiere in Europa hosten sollten, sie gleichzeitig die Anforderungen des Kapitalmarktrechts sowie strenge Datenschutz- und Privatsphärestandards erfüllen müssten.