Doubling in a day: Stacks founder explains the Bitcoin Layer 2 concept of STX.

Original author: Stacks founder Muneeb

Translated by: 0x711, BlockBeats

Bitcoin Layer 2 network Stacks founder Muneeb shared on his social media platform the development history and vision of Stacks. BlockBeats translated and organized as follows:

Stacks is an open-source project initiated by Bitcoin builders. The developers behind it have extensive experience in building applications and protocols based on the Bitcoin network.

After the 2017 block size war, it became clear that the only way to scale transactions or introduce new use cases on Bitcoin was to build on top of the Bitcoin network layer. This led to the development of the Lightning Network and Stacks.

Stacks is a Bitcoin Layer 2 that allows for the use of smart contracts. It has a separate ledger to store data outside of Bitcoin L1, and developers can build any application on top of it. Anything that can be built on Ethereum or Solana can also be built on Stacks L2s. Please read the latest documentation for Stacks.

The initial version of Stacks was launched in early 2021. This version uses the secure programming language Clarity and has the ability to read the Bitcoin network state, as well as enabling atomic swaps between BTC and any L2 assets. The initial version also had some bottlenecks. Stacks later updated to the Nakamoto version.

The upcoming next version will add a decentralized BTC anchor, which will make it easy to transfer BTC in and out of Stacks L2. At the same time, this version will also undergo security upgrades, with finality determined by 100% of Bitcoin's hash power. Finally, this version will also improve block speed, no longer being limited by Bitcoin's block time.

Decentralized BTC anchoring work is actively being built by open source developers. The goal is to unlock $500 billion worth of BTC funds. Just as Ordinals has contributed to Bitcoin NFTs, sBTC can bring about huge changes to Bitcoin DeFi.

Stacks vs. Lightning Network Comparison

Stacks and Lightning Network are both layer 2 networks for Bitcoin. Lightning Network is a P2P network for payments; Stacks is more like an L2 chain for fully expressive smart contracts.

STX Utility

The release of STX was unprecedentedly licensed by the SEC at the time. The project achieved decentralization before the mainnet launch and now has over 30 independent entities and developers. STX is used as a reward for miners and sBTC peg-out signers, and its role is to maintain decentralized mining and signing. After the launch of sBTC, users will be able to use sBTC on most wallets and applications.

Stacks L2 上的 NFT

"Stacks L2 NFTs"

There is an active community of artists and creators on Stacks L2. People have minted 650,000 Bitcoin NFTs on Stacks L2. All of these NFTs are automatically hashed onto Bitcoin L1 and secured by Bitcoin in a scalable way. Additionally, many NFT builders are active on Bitcoin L1 using Ordinals. Examples include Gamma.io and Satoshibles.

Ordinals vs L2 NFTs Comparison

Ordinals based on Bitcoin L1 and L2 NFTs complement each other. Ordinals are naturally limited by the scalability of L1, while L2 provides an obvious path for expansion. Wallets like Xverse and Hiro Wallet currently support Ordinals.

Stacks L2 DeFi

Currently, contracts on Stacks L2 have locked in $250 million and distributed 2200 bitcoins as rewards to users. You can follow ALEX and Arkadiko Protocol on Twitter. Similar to Bitcoin NFTs, Bitcoin DeFi is still in its early stages.

Stacks is a decentralized ecosystem that is constantly changing and growing. To learn more, please continue to follow the official Stacks page.

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