Zest Protocol Monthly Update - June

Welcome to the first Zest Protocol monthly update!

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We’ll be capturing everything that’s happened in May and June to kick things off.

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Our Stacks Lending Market officially went live on mainnet on May 10th - marking the beginning of our path towards providing on-chain BTC lending and yield markets. A huge thank you to everyone who helped make this launch a great success! 

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That’s just the tip of the iceberg, here’s a TL;DR of what we’ll cover in this post:

• Announced our $3.5m raise led by Tim Draper
• Skyrocketed our TVL from $8m to $39m
• Became the third largest DeFi protocol on Stacks
• Kicked off our loyalty program with Zest Points
• Partnered with OKX Wallet, onboarding 50 million users to Zest
• Created an stSTX borrowing market with $500k in loans taken out
• Enabled depositing and borrowing for Arkadiko’s $DIKO

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We’ve got a lot to discuss here, so let’s dive in!

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Let’s start with our $3.5m raise led by Tim Draper, with participation from Binance Labs, Flow Traders, Trust Machines, Asymmetric, and more!

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We’re excited to have amazing investors backing Zest Protocol and supporting our mission of creating a fully Bitcoin native lending experience.

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“I don’t want to just hold BTC - I want to use it!” said Tim Draper. “I’ve ran many experiments to deploy BTC productively, but it hasn’t been easy. I’m excited to see the team at Zest Protocol make it happen and look forward to using the product once BTC deposits open.” Full article here.

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“Zest Protocol's technology addresses the needs of Bitcoin holders and borrowers, unlocking the potential for Bitcoin programmability. At Binance Labs, we are always seeking first movers shaping the industry, and we look forward to witnessing Stacks’ Nakamoto upgrade propel Zest Protocol’s growth.,” said Yi He, Co-Founder of Binance and Head of Binance Labs. Full article here.

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Stacks market growth in the last month has been fast. TVL jumped from $8m to $39m, making Zest Protocol the third largest protocol on Stacks. Next stop, #1!

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TVL isn’t the only number going up, all of our social media metrics grew just as fast. We’ve welcomed over 30k combined new community members to our Twitter, Telegram, and Discord channels! Our community grows stronger every day and we’d love to see you stop by and say hi👋

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Would we be a top DeFi project without a points program? Zest Points are the zestiest way to get rewarded for interacting with the Zest Protocol platform.

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Every deposit on the platform earns points. $1 deposited = 1 Zest Point per day - we like to keep things simple for the degens out there. 

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You can check your points and position on the leaderboard at any time here! Just know, the higher on the leaderboard you are, the more valuable you are to the protocol 😉

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We also partnered with one of the leading Web3 wallets: OKX Wallet. With over 50 million users worldwide, this adds additional ways to interact with Zest Protocol!

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OKX Wallet joins Xverse, Leather, and Asigna in our wallet integrations. These are currently the largest wallets with Stacks support. All users of these wallets are able to easily connect to https://app.zestprotocol.com and start earning yield on their idle Stacks assets.

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Our relationship with StackingDAO only grows stronger: stSTX borrowing was enabled and over $500k is currently being borrowed .

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stSTX borrowing is a huge unlock for stSTX holders wanting to maximize the yield and benefits of their assets. Not only can users earn yield passively from stSTX emissions - but also real APY paid out by borrowers.

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Parking your stSTX into Zest Protocol continues to be a no-brainer. Earn 1.5x StackingDAO points + 1x Zest Points as well as the yield stacking above! Get yourself some stSTX here.

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We also welcomed a new asset to Zest Protocol, Arkadiko Finance’s $DIKO token!

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$DIKO is the governance token of the Arkadiko ecosystem, and it can now be deposited and borrowed on Zest Protocol!

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There are some really creative ways to arbitrage the interest rates on Zest and Arkadiko:

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Stake your borrowed $DIKO on the official Arkadiko Finance site here! More assets will be listed in the future, stay tuned and definitely let us know what you’d like to see on Zest.

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That wraps up this action packed May and June update! We have a lot more planned leading up to the Nakamoto Upgrade and the sBTC launch that we’ll use to revolutionize Bitcoin lending. The Stacks Nakamoto release is only 2 months away. It’s time to build!

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Follow us on Twitter for all of the latest updates and memes.

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Join our zesty community via Discord and Telegram!

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And as usual, stay zesty🍊

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