In a bear market, price action like RUNE\u2019s stands out.<\/p>\n
The governance token of the cross-chain liquidity protocol THORChain<\/a> has surged over 40% this week despite a brutal selloff<\/a> across broader markets. RUNE hit a four-month high of $1.64 on Aug. 18.<\/p>\n The momentum isn\u2019t limited to the token \u2014 THORChain also notched up a record volume day on Aug. 14, when it facilitated over $100M of trades.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Wealthy investors have begun to use the protocol for large swaps, FamiliarCow, the Communications Director for Nine Realms, the THORChain core developers’ group, told The Defiant.<\/p>\n The project facilitated its largest ever swap<\/a> of 3150 ETH for 2,482,348 RUNE, worth roughly $3.65M, on Aug. 15. \u201cWe’re seeing like these big trades that we haven’t really seen before,\u201d FamiliarCow said. He attributes the volume to a new product called streaming swaps<\/a> which launched on Aug. 1.<\/p>\n Streaming swaps break up cross-chain trades into smaller parts that are executed over up to 24 hours. As the trade progresses, arbitrageurs step in to rebalance the pool so that less value is lost to slippage.<\/p>\n \u201cIt’s opening up a new market because obviously you can put a lot of size through so the whales are coming to town,\u201d FamiliarCow said.<\/p>\n THORChain\u2019s momentum is notable because of the project\u2019s unique position in DeFi \u2014 it\u2019s not quite a bridge, which moves homogenous assets across blockchains \u2014 it\u2019s more like an exchange like Coinbase or Binance, which facilitates trades between tokens with the endpoints being each asset\u2019s native blockchain.<\/p>\n Considering that the SEC has sued both Binance<\/a> and Coinbase<\/a> as part of a broader crypto crackdown, a decentralized application like THORChain may prove particularly valuable to the crypto ecosystem. This is because it fills a similar role to the exchange but, at least in theory, has a smaller regulatory attack surface by being decentralized.<\/p>\n FamiliarCow didn\u2019t shy away from comparisons to billion-dollar behemoths. \u201cWhat\u2019s being built here is honestly the replacement of the centralized exchange,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n To be sure, THORChain has faced its share of bumps in the road.<\/p>\n The project suffered back-to-back hacks resulting in roughly $13M of lost assets in July 2021. And its RUNE token remains over 90% off its all-time high of $20.24, which came in May 2021 when most DeFi tokens peaked.<\/p>\n![\"the-defiant\"](\"https:\/\/thedefiant.io\/_next\/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.sanity.io%2Fimages%2F6oftkxoa%2Fproduction%2Fd3dfaa3fc57db5568ed1231ca155a7fad9afe2a3-646x311.jpg&w=828&q=75\")
Streaming Swaps<\/h2>\n
Past Exploits<\/h2>\n