The Cosmos Hub Roadmap 2.0 (2024)

A community-led vision for the Cosmos Hub

The Cosmos Hub Roadmap 2.0 (1)

Earlier this year, Cosmos completed its whitepaper, fulfilling its founding vision of blockchain interoperability, scalability, and usability that was laid out in the original 2016 roadmap. This was an impressive milestone achievement, considering the many engineering and social challenges that can plague blockchain roadmaps.

Cosmos is a collaborative ecosystem in which innovation is applauded and, by paving the way for a sustainable multichain future, enterprises of all stripes are creating and connecting their own sovereign blockchains to a burgeoning network. Now, more than 30 enterprise-grade public chains comprise the Cosmos, including Binance Coin, Terra, Crypto.com, Cosmos Hub, and OKB, as well as more than 240 apps and services. Together, they represent a market capitalization that totals more than $75 billion — no idle feat for being live less than three years!

How did Cosmos achieve this goal? Beyond an exceptional ability to develop solutions to challenging decentralized systems problems, the community establishes enterprise-grade standards and drives them to production-ready implementations. That’s to say, the community sets the bar extremely high and never loses sight of the finish line.

The Story of Cosmos

Cosmos has a rich and storied history. What began as Jae Kwon and Ethan Buchman’s creation of what is now the Tendermint consensus algorithm has evolved into a thriving community that grew from the Fundraiser in 2017, to the current multi-entity virtual organization that powers hundreds of innovative blockchain apps and services today.

The Cosmos Hub — The Heart of the Cosmos Ecosystem

At the heart of the Cosmos ecosystem is the Cosmos Hub and its native ATOM token. At its 2019 launch, the Cosmos Hub focused on basic functionality, such as asset transfers, delegated Proof of Stake, and on-chain governance; ATOM holders can delegate stake to validators that secure the Cosmos Hub in return for transaction fees and staking rewards.

More recently, the activation of the Inter-Blockchain Communication (IBC) protocol enables the transfer of digital assets and messages between Cosmos blockchains, and these interchain connections lift the Cosmos Hub to new levels of scalability and utility. With increased DeFi functionality working its way throughout the Cosmos ecosystem, we are on the cusp of many novel approaches to realizing ATOM’s utility in securing and governing Cosmos blockchains.

Now that the 1.0 roadmap has been delivered, let’s take a look at some of the major use cases that cement the Cosmos Hub as the economic center of a vibrant Port City with trade routes to the most important blockchain economies.

The Cosmos Hub Roadmap 2.0

In the Cosmos Hub Roadmap 2.0, we’ll be enhancing Cosmos Hub functionality by focusing on key areas like liquidity, economic security, usability, and participation — giving the Hub a fresh coat of paint and making it even more attractive for community members.

Cross-Chain Protocols Bringing DeFi to Cosmos

The Cosmos Hub Roadmap 2.0 (2)

Prioritized on the new roadmap are two liquidity products that focus on capital allocation and cross-chain token transfers, which are expected to land on the Hub very soon.

Gravity DEX protocol enables token swaps using an AMM model that delivers better price consistency and order execution, among many other compelling features, such as order book capability and reduced transaction fees. Paired with IBC, Gravity DEX is a powerful component in cross-chain DeFi protocols, and we foresee extensive automation and flexibility in delivery of DeFi services. Furthermore, providing an AMM on the Cosmos Hub allows enterprises with IBC-connected sovereign blockchains to focus on serving specialized products to their users without the challenges of sourcing liquidity.

The free flow of assets between chains will continue to expand with the launch of the secure decentralized Gravity Bridge that connects the Hub (and other Cosmos chains) to Ethereum and EVM-compatible chains. Gravity Bridge enables the transfer of ATOM, tokens on the Cosmos Hub, Ether (ETH), and ERC20 tokens. This will allow users to carry out DeFi on Cosmos and Ethereum, enriching DeFi in the Cosmos ecosystem through a virtuous feedback loop.

Staking Derivatives to Increase the Utility of ATOM

ATOM holders currently receive rewards by staking their tokens to validators securing the Cosmos Hub; however, these tokens must be bonded. On the horizon in roadmap 2.0, are staking derivatives that will allow for the collateralization of delegations, such as for DeFi lending and Gravity DEX swaps. ATOM holders can, therefore, stake their tokens while enjoying the benefits that the broader DeFi ecosystem offers.

Interchain Staking to Secure New Chains

The Cosmos Hub Roadmap 2.0 (3)

Also included in the Cosmos Hub Roadmap 2.0 is Interchain Staking, which stands out with its integration of IBC with Proof of Stake to bootstrap the economic security of new chains.

With interchain staking, validators on a parent chain that choose to validate on a baby chain will be slashable on the parent chain. This means that validators that are already trusted with securing the Cosmos Hub will also be able to provide security to new chains, earning even more rewards for securing baby chains and being subject to penalties for misbehavior.

Our enthusiasm for interchain composable security just cannot be contained. Not only does it exponentially increase the utility of the ATOM but it allows for younger chains to fast-track their projects and opt-in to using the Cosmos Hub validator set, should they wish to.

NFTs, Governance, Interchain Accounts, and More

In the next phase, the Cosmos Hub will deploy new modules to help better manage NFTs, governance, accounts, and authorization. We’re already making significant headway with these initiatives and will be providing you with further details as we proceed along with the roadmap.

The Cosmos Community Makes It All Possible

As you may already know, the community governs all of the Cosmos Hub upgrades through on-chain voting. The next upgrade is taking place within the next few weeks after the community voted its overwhelming support for the cross-chain DeFi protocol Gravity DEX.

The Cosmos Hub ecosystem is growing exponentially with connections to other chains and expanding DeFi capabilities, which solidify ATOM as the economic center of the Cosmos.

With the successful completion of the whitepaper, we’re looking forward to delivering our New Cosmos Hub roadmap 2.0 with the feedback and support of our community.

The Cosmos Hub Roadmap 2.0 (2024)
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