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In this post I am going to cover a few different subjects as I explain my journey to uncover what could be an interesting opportunity for X7 and its community:

  • the trouble I was having buying X7 NFTs on BNB
  • what I tried to solve the problem
  • what that solution was built on
  • could this help X7 deliver better prices/higher liquidity to its users
  • could this be a way to provide unified governance across chains (I am concerned less then ideal actions on one chain could negatively effect other chains)
  • in addition to the above, should we be talking to this solution about integrating with X7

The trouble I was having buying X7 NFTs on BNB

I wanted to buy X7 on all the chains X7 is going live on to show my support for the project. I had never used Binance or BNB before, so I bridged some DAI across to the BNB network. So far so good. Now I wanted to swap the DAI for BNB tokens so I could mint the NFTs and this is where I ran into problems. Because I did not have any BNB tokens in my wallet I could not pay the gas fees in BNB to convert DAI into BNB. Sort of a chicken and the egg problem.

What I tried to solve the problem

Use a CEX to buy the BNB. I believe in Defi and really want to use Defi where possible. So this was going to be my last resort.

Buy BNB via MetaMask using Moonpay or Transak. I wasn’t keen on this idea either, but I figured lesser of two evils. After going through some very intrusive identification and account verification procedures - all of my credit and debit cards refused to allow transactions through Moonpay or Transak. Grrrrr

Then I stumbled across Squid Router. It is sort of a combination between a bridge and a dex in that you can swap a token on one network to a different token on another network. It worked perfectly - 20 minutes later I had some BNB in my wallet to pay the gas fees to convert my DAI to more BNB to buy the X7 NFTs I wanted. Problem solved.

What was Squid built on?

I am nothing but curious especially when something solves a problem for me. So I dug in a little deeper to see what Squid was built on and the answer is Axelar which focused on cross chain activities and sets out 3 specific use cases:

  • Composable liquidity - Create a cross-chain DEX or AMM that connects liquidity from multiple chains.
  • Cross-chain governance - DAOs can coordinate activity anywhere on Web3.
  • Cross-chain NFTs - DeFi: use NFTs as collateral on other chains. Gaming: any asset, anywhere, becomes currency or credential.

So that brings you up to date on my journey, now here are my questions.

Could Axelar or something similar help X7 deliver better prices/higher liquidity to its users?

X7 is going to have Xchange running on at least 5 different networks. To help users get best pricing, it is going to route orders to the Dex on that network with the deepest liquidity pool. But what if a better price is available on a different network? Should Xchange be using Axelar or something similar to route that order across to the Xchange on the network with the better price? One problem might be timing - Squid takes 20 to 30 minutes to finalize transactions like a lot of bridges do. But maybe because Xchange controls the liquidity pools on both networks that could be negated?

Could Axelar or something similar provide unified governance across chains?

At the moment each version of Xchange on each different network will have it’s own DAO. This could be a positive as it may make the Xchange on that network more reflective of and responsive to the needs of that particular network. But look 5 years down the track - Xchange on each network could be very different with very different reputations based on the decisions of each different DAO. One bad apple may spoil it for all other networks. Would it be smarter to use Axelar or something similar to provide more unified governance across chains to protect the X7 Xchange brand and image long into the future.

Should we be talking to this solution about integrating with X7 Xchange?

Regardless of the above, maybe we should be talking to the devs behind SQUID and Axelar about integrating with X7 Xchange. I noticed Axelar have developer grants that might be available to help that cause.