UNWRAPPING APECHAIN: Here's How Horizen Labs Will Make ApeChain Powered By $Ape
$Ape is getting an optional Omnichain Fungible Token (OFT) wrapper sometime next month as the coin gets ready to transform from an ERC-20 governance token into a currency that powers its own ecosystem and more!
On Friday, the ApeCoin DAO community got the chance to learn more about ApeChain during the DAO’s first space with the Horizen Labs, Offchain Labs and Arbitrum team that is building ApeChain following the community’s approval of their proposal in February, 2024.
“This is the moment where we are starting to get things really going, Horizen Labs’ Vice President of Ecosystem Growth Blockchainzilla AKA Spencer said. “For those of you who do not know, Apechain is being built as an Arbitrum Orbit chain. It is going to be a gaming first, but not gaming only chain. Its ultimately supposed to be a theme park for ApeCoin, where everything is denominated ApeCoin, not just the gas fees. Pairs are in ApeCoin, incentives are in ApeCoin. We are trying to get on games, applications, protocols that are all using ApeCoin in their economies. Up to this point, we have been heads down and that has been setting a lot of the groundwork.”
During today’s space, ApeCoin DAO Facilitator Lost reminded the community that not only was this proposal about building ApeChain as part of the Arbitrum Orbit chains, but also that this proposal was about transforming $Ape into an Omnichain Fungible Token in collaboration with Layer Zero that can be used to power ApeChain and travel throughout various ecosystems.
“The idea is that there will be an adaptive contract that will be wrapped around ApeCoin,” Spencer said. “Once the OFT wrap is on top of ApeCoin, it's going to make it really easy to move it throughout different ecosystems. So if you go and you look at the Layer Zero network, it includes tons of networks. For us this will open up a couple of things. The first priority is getting ApeCoin off just sitting on Ethereum so it's more useful in defi, gaming, and other ecosystems. The top place we want to send $Ape to is ApeChain. But it's also important to get it within the Arbitrum ecosystem which will share a number of protocols, which we will share in the next couple of weeks. Beyond that though, the thing that OFT $Ape will also lead up to is that the $Ape just doesn’t have to sit there. You should be able to go and use and get $Ape on Blast, on Base, on Optimism, on Polygon, and it's going to open up all those types of opportunities. It’s kind of like the modernization of ApeCoin and bringing all of that out. Which is super exciting and its going to position ApeCoin kind of uniquely."
Spencer Also explained that there will be ‘no forced migration’ of $Ape into this wrapper, so anyone who is currently holding or staking $Ape on Ethereum will not need to do anything.
Spencer also teased that he and the ApeChain team will be inviting the Layer Zero team onto their next Apechain space to further discuss this $Ape wrapper and its implications.
The Bored Ape Gazette is working to bring you additional coverage of today’s Apechain Space and will keep you posted on this OFT Wrapper. Stay tuned for updates
