Bancor Network (BNT)

Bancor Network, widely recognized for its innovative approach to decentralized trading, is a suite of open-source protocols designed to enhance on-chain trading and liquidity.

At the heart of its ecosystem lies the Carbon protocol, which empowers users to implement automated trading strategies through customizable on-chain limit and range orders. This feature allows traders to merge orders and develop strategies that capitalize on price fluctuations, enabling them to automate their buying and selling processes effectively.

In addition, Bancor offers Fast Lane, an autonomous arbitrage protocol that allows users to exploit price differences between Bancor's protocols and external on-chain exchanges, redirecting any arbitrage gains back into the Bancor ecosystem.

Governance within Bancor is managed by the BancorDAO, where holders of staked BNT tokens participate in decision-making processes for the development and management of ecosystem protocols.

What sets Bancor apart is its groundbreaking Carbon protocol, which enhances the trading experience by facilitating automated strategies with greater efficacy and control than traditional decentralized exchanges (DEXs). Conventional on-chain liquidity solutions face significant challenges, such as the potential for executed orders to be reversed with shifting prices and the requirement for a single liquidity position to manage both buying and selling at the same price curve. These limitations can complicate on-chain liquidity management and expose traders to risks like miner extractable value (MEV) sandwich attacks.

Carbon introduces Asymmetric Liquidity, allowing the creation of separate liquidity positions with distinct pricing curves for buying and selling. This innovation enables users to set specific price ranges for their orders, along with the ability to combine them for automated buy low, sell high strategies. Once executed, Carbon orders are irreversible, can be adjusted directly on-chain, and are designed to resist MEV sandwich attacks. This level of control and automation empowers users to explore new trading methodologies on-chain.

For example, someone anticipating that ETH will fluctuate between $1500 and $2000 could establish a Carbon strategy to automatically purchase ETH between $1500 and $1600, while selling it between $1900 and $2000. As prices fall within these specified ranges, trades are executed automatically without reliance on third-party oracles or keepers. Furthermore, strategy modifications can be made in a gas-efficient manner without needing to withdraw and re-add liquidity, simply by adjusting parameters within the smart contract.

Carbon also enhances the trading paradigm seen in centralized exchanges by allowing users to create multi-order strategies that utilize a single liquidity source for trade execution, which streamlines the trading process and eliminates the necessity of creating multiple limit orders.

Bancor has a rich history, having pioneered the first blockchain-based automated market maker (AMM) in 2017. The initial version of the protocol was launched in June 2017, with subsequent updates refining the original AMM concept.

In 2020, the BancorDAO was established to govern the evolution of Bancor’s protocols. Since its inception, the DAO has evaluated over 450 governance proposals and engaged over 9,700 token holders, with more than 1,100 actively participating in voting.

Looking ahead, the Bancor community is dedicated to advancing Carbon and Fast Lane. The beta version of Fast Lane is currently operational on the Ethereum mainnet and is set for continuous development, while the Carbon beta version is projected to launch on the Ethereum mainnet in the second quarter of 2023, subject to BancorDAO voting. Future efforts will also explore deploying both protocols on various Layer-1 and Layer-2 blockchains.

Bancor's mission remains clear: to create innovative solutions that broaden the possibilities for on-chain trading and liquidity, opening pathways to a diverse array of future decentralized finance (DeFi) applications and products.

The Bancor Network Token (BNT) serves multiple purposes, including staking for vBNT, which allows users to participate in BancorDAO governance. Additional uses for BNT will be determined by the community through the BancorDAO.