ZeroSwap AMA with Wolf Crypto
We held an AMA with ZeroSwap in our public Telegram channel on October 10th.
ZeroSwap is a new on-chain DEX platform powered by its own protocol.
The Zeroswap DEX features -
- Multi-Chain Support (ETH & BSC)
- On-chain Trading
- Zero Fees
- Liquidity Mining
- Transaction Mining
- DeFi Token Offerings
- DEX Aggregation
- Market Maker Support (no AMM)
The ZeroSwap Protocol features -
- Gasless Transactions — All on-chain trades and addition/removal of liquidity are processed via gas-less transactions, facilitated by transaction fee mining.
- Zero-Fees — Trading and addition/removal of liquidity on the protocol is at ZERO cost.
- Rewards — Users earn rewards from Liquidity Mining, each time they trade on-chain and provide liquidity.
- DEX Aggregation — ZeroSwap aggregates liquidity from all the existing protocols to facilitate the best rates.
- Governance — A unanimous governance mechanism to govern the ZeroSwap Protocol powered by the ZEE token.
- Developer Friendly — ZeroSwap includes an SDK that allows developers to build and easily integrate into ZeroSwap using their existing workflows.
ZeroSwap launches in late October with a ~$1.2m USD market cap.
You can learn more about the project here —
You can also visit the ZeroSwap Telegram channel or the ZeroSwap website for further details.
Here’s what ZeroSwaps’s CEO & Co-founder Chandrashekar Ramu and COO & Co-founder Aayushi Jain had to say in the AMA.*
*This AMA has been edited for clarity.
WC (Wolf Crypto Telegram Member)
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to another edition of Wolf Crypto AMA…the third AMA for the week here at Wolf Crypto…and they say we’re back in a bear market…Let me tell you, in the bear we weren’t doing three AMA’s a week, that’s for sure!
But anyways, today we have Chandrashekar Ramu and Aayushi Jain from ZeroSwap joining us!
TEAM & TEAM GOALS
WC
Welcome! It’s our pleasure to have you here today.
Before we get into the crux of what ZeroSwap is, how about you give me some background as to your experience in the industry prior to founding ZeroSwap?
CR
My background has been web development and I have been an active trader in stock markets. Crypto happened to me through trading experience and when Iwanted to trade new types of commodities.
Since I was a programmer, I always traded through bots which I wrote.
AJ
Hi Everyone!
First of all thanks for providing the opportunity to speak on this platform, have been following Wolf Crypto for a long time, so it’s an honour for us to be invited here.
I have been into the crypto industry for 4 years, my interests are product management and building customer relationships. I have helped shape a couple of products, including Frontier in the initial days. I came to know of Bitcoin back in 2016, when I was working on a freelancing project.
WC
Thank you for the intros guys.
Could you also give us some background on some of the team members who aren’t joining us today?
AJ
Sure, our CTO Puneet Bagewadi won’t be joining us today.
He has 10+ years of experience in software development and has developed blockchain software for Visa INC. Ex-Mobstack and Wipro.
CR
Our entire development team works out of Bangalore, the IT Hub of India. We have bunch of experienced developers and couple of fresh engineers from college.
In Bangalore, it’s really easy to find developers with high quality skills.
THE ZEROSWAP PROTOCOL
WC
With that out of the way, let’s start with what ZeroSwap is…
What’s your elevator pitch on ZeroSwap and the value proposition of yet another DEX based protocol/platform in a DeFi landscape that seems to have a new DEX platform or protocol popping up every other day?
AJ
Indeed, there are lots of protocols are coming out these days to solve the existing problem of DEX’s, but we are primarily trying to solve two most important problems with on-chain transactions, which are gas costs and trade fees.
Our value proposition is Zero Fee Trades and Gasless Transactions.
WC
Haha, I’m VERY glad to hear you’re not just another SushiSwap or BSCSwap…but I do have to ask, since you’re going to be compared to those type of platforms anyways…just for the sheer fact you too have “swap” in your name, what’s your thoughts on them and the whole food style swap platforms that have come up over the last little while?
AJ
The beauty of crypto is the fun part which comes along with the thrill, of an ever changing industry and the markets being operational 24/7.
The Sushi, and Pancakes certainly brought lots of fun and colour to the crypto world. With regards to “swap” it basically means interchanging A to B, so we have also kept it in our name, however the prefix of Swap is Zero, which signifies zero trade fees and zero gas costs for trading.
CR
In fact Sushiswap or any other food-coin can be be integrated to ZeroSwap suite for gasless transactions.
It was really good to get good amount of volume until the first rug-pull started. Now there are so-many rug-pull happening.
At ZeroSwap we have a finite supply and we are not an anon team. We raised all our funds though legal docs!
WC
Haha, we won’t be calling you Chef Ramu anytime soon then!
I note that something a lot of those other swap platforms have in common is that the underlying architecture is based on AMM technology.
Is this also the case for ZeroSwap?
CR
No, We aren’t an AMM, PMM, MM etc.
Instead all those platforms can leverage our protocol for gasless transactions.
As a DEX aggregator, we will also be relying on existing AMMs and by using ZeroSwap, users can provide liquidity to existing AMM’s and earn rewards in ZEE tokens.
WC
Can you explain to me what a “Market-Making Suite” actually involves in practice?
I assume this is only possible due to the gasless and zero fee transactions on ZeroSwap? (which we’ll get into more detail on in a sec).
AJ
There are no Decentralized Market making suites currently, ours would be an API which would facilitate the existing market makers to provide services to their users.
The key point to be noted is that all the transactions would go through our relayer.
Anyone can build a market making suite and having said that we will have all transactions in gasless manner. So that is a plus plus.
WC
Fully, that is one thing I’m VERY interested to see play out, I’ve know a couple of teams/projects/guys attempt marketing making on DEX’s before and all have been a huge fail due to the ETH network either being too slow or too costly…
AJ
Yes, because of gasless transactions, market making via ZeroSwap would be cost savy, and so we’re looking forward to being able to execute this.
CR
With all due respect to gasless transactions, we need to be very careful about off-chain order books.
If we try to modify the books off-chain, SEC will come after us for a forced rug-pull!
WC
Haha, I love the “forced rug-pull” terminology, I’m going to use that one myself in the future!
So one of the reasons market makers exist is liquidity and just to tie it into what we were just talking about…
One of the most common features of those types of platforms is the aspect of “vampire liquidity” in which platforms incentivise users to suck, or migrate their liquidity from one platform to another, using a token they’re created in order to do so.
In general terms, what are your thoughts on that type of strategy and the “stickiness” of such liquidity?
AJ
Liquidity mining in its current form is similar to that of Uber giving free coupons to take rides initially and then customers dropping off later.
For the users to have a stickiness to one platform, they need to be provided with long term incentives to stay on that platform.
This is one of the major that we are working on right now, thought we do not want to unveil everything at the moment.
WC
You’ve made some rather bold claims as part of your documentation for the project. Let’s go through those…firstly the one that really caught my eye, and as I mentioned before, gasless transactions…
How is that even possible?!
CR
Transactions would be gasless, using meta transactions and transaction fee mining. We have raised in ETH and we’ll initially bootstrap the gas to the relayer on the protocol and in parallel we will generate ZEE tokens every time there is trade.
We will fund the relayer with these ZEE tokens when the ETH value starts to tend zero.
Meta transactions are already being used by lots of existing projects however no-one has tried to tokenize these with incentivization model.
WC
You mention a relayer there in your response…
Would you mind providing a bit more detail as to the role of relayers as part of the protocol…what they do and who they are?
Is this something an ordinary user can run, or is it something you do in partnership with technology providers?
CR
We will not be using other technology partners for a relayer, instead we will build our own relayer for the protocol, with the relayers role being to to make the entire transaction gasless.
Most relayers are same. There isn’t much difference between them. On ZeroSwap we have a protocol layer which provides gas to these relayers which means our moat is our recursive protocol, this makes our entire system self sustainable.
WC
Impressive, sounds like actual utility for the token by baking it into the protocol in such a manner
So in a similar vein to the “bold claims” line of questioning, zero fee transactions…firstly the project name now makes a lot more sense to me…haha…but this sounds like another too good to be true claim?
Is it a simple case of gasless = feeless, or is it slightly more complicated than that?
AJ
This is quite an interesting question, and something that all our community members have been asking.
It’s actually not complicated at all. It’s a plain simple functionality of using meta transactions, using a relayer, and transaction fee mining to make the entire protocol operate in a gasless and zero fee trade. no rocket science, all cool.
WC
So from my understanding users using the protocol will be rewarded for interacting with it.
Is this like a Uniswap one off stimulus payment or is it something more continuous?
AJ
We would be rewarding users every time they make a trade with ZEE tokens, it is however very different then how Uniswap operates.
We will unveil this once the protocol is launched, at the moment we’re releasing the juice one be one.
WC
That sounds like a great way to get and keep people trading on the platform!
So DEX aggregation, while an amazing concept, is not exactly a new one, as we have DEX aggregators like Paraswap and 1inch already live.
What makes ZeroSwap’s DEX aggregation any different to these?
CR
DEX Aggregation is primarily used to solve the liquidity problem, we are no different then other exchanges. We will aggregate the existing protocols and then provide trading in a gasless manner with zero charge on trade fee.
We are definitely no different from 1inch or Paraswap, in fact we love them and we’re gasless proxy layer on top of them that works in combination with them to enhance the end user experience.
WC
As far as I’m aware, ZeroSwap will support two main chains on launch, of course, Etherrum, I think we all know the reasons for that one, but also Binance Smart Chain.
What was the logic of picking Binance Smart Chain as your second chain integration?
CR
We have seen very good traction, and many interesting projects are building on Binance Smart Chain, therefore we chose them. Not to forget they are also EVM compatible!
Being a developer, the same code works out of the box on both the chains without any code changes and being trader’s, how can we ignore that B word.
The B word definitely has some good users and volume!
WC
So tell me what the logic behind multi-chain support is instead of developing your own chain and hosting the DEX and associated liquidity on that instead?
AJ
So building on top of the DEX’s that already has a product market fit is a better idea, then building our own DEX at the moment.
We are multi chain, because for example, Ethereum and Binance Smart Chain already have a product market fit and users are already interacting with them and developers want to build products on them.
So it was an easy decision to integrate on them by basically building a UX by which users can interact with already matured chains and have the added benefit of Zero Fee Trade and Gasless Transactions.
WC
Product market fit = means existing liquidity in this context as well, which means a MUCH more usable product offering from day one…a very important point to note IMO!
It’s funny you say that about BSC as I recently saw these tweets that echo your sentiments there…it seems the liquidity pool on BSC is only growing, as are the yields…
So how seamless will it be for users to interact with each chain on ZeroSwap?
I assume it’s simply a case of switching networks on Metamask?
AJ
In terms of UX it would be simply switching networks on Metamask, but later on we will also have other wallets on which users can interact on both Ethereum and Binance Smart Chain.
One click and go, go go!
WC
I can’t talk about chains without talking about Polkadot, as it seems like every man and his dog are looking to integrate with it?
Do you have any plans to support Polka? And what other chains do you have your eyes on re integration?
AJ
We are surely exploring the ecosystem of Polkadot however for now we have only finalised with integrating Ethereum and Binance Smart Chain.
More to come on that soon though!
THE ZEROSWAP PLATFORM
WC
So we’ve spoken a lot on the protocol, but let’s move onto the platform itself.
In lieu of a roadmap in your documentation, can you give us a preview of the look and feel of the platform, a timeline as to when they’ll be a MVP and when we can expect a full launch of the platform?
AJ
The full launch of the protocol can be expected within 60 days from now. Right now we are at the audit stage with reputed auditors, parallely testing it in alpha internally.
The look and feel would be the simplest of all the DEXes, easy for a non-tech user to trade without understanding what is going under the hood.
WC
You mentioned earlier that instead of an AMM, ZeroSwap is powered by a Market-Making Suite.
Does this mean the DEX interface will be more traditional, with an order book and the like, rather than a Uniswap style interface where a user can only market buy?
AJ
Yes we will have a market making suite.
It will help us build order-books, we will have limit orders and other features. Our interface won’t be like Uniswap.
WC
Who would be the ideal candidates to support marketing making on the platform? Traditional market makers, like the GSR’s, Altonomy’s etc of the world?
AJ
We are exploring traditional market makers and hedge funds to support market making, this would be for the initial push.
Later on we will also consider the participation of whales in the market making suite.
WC
Transaction mining is something that I haven’t heard of in some time. FCoin and Bitmax are the two that come to mind when I think of transaction mining…I hope that transaction mining on ZeroSwap will have a happier story than it did for those two!
Can you explain to me how transaction mining works on ZeroSwap and how both the platform itself, and the users who participate in the process benefit from it?
CR
It is important to note, on ZeroSwap, it is not transaction mining, it is transaction fee mining.
AJ
Yes, like Chandrashekar said, we will have transaction fee mining, which is different then transaction mining on Bitmax.
With transaction fee mining, ZEE tokens are generated every time there is a trade to reward the users and to make the protocol self sustainable.
WC
So there’s a big difference between transaction mining and transaction fee mining hey?
CR
Definitely, transaction fee mining are used on ZeroSwap to mine ZEE tokens which then provide gasless transactions.
WC
How about liquidity mining? What’s the difference between the two sets of mining, transaction and liquidity?
CR
Liquidity mining is incentivising users every time they provide liquidity to existing AMMs which is different then liquidity mining on Uniswap for example.
WC
You’ve mentioned “self sustaining” a couple of times…
Can you go into a bit more detail as to how these kinds of incentives, liquidity and transaction mining, actually make the protocol and platform “self sustainable”?
AJ
There is always a demand side and the supply side of a token and we will have liquidity mining to incentivize users for providing liquidity, however transaction fee mining will also make the transactions gasless.
There is also a demand side of the ZEE token which is our utilities like DTO and the market making suite.
Net-Net the entire supply and demand of ZEE will make the protocol self sustainable.
WC
In researching in preparation for this AMA, I noticed some chat about staking in your Telegram group, and the launch of a staking program soon after the TGE.
Is this related to transaction or liquidity mining or is it something entirely separate?
AJ
It is simply related to staking of ZEE tokens.
We have a partnership with Frontier which is the largest DeFi suite. Users will be able to stake their ZEE tokens using the Frontier application.
WC
So with ZeroSwap doing DEX aggregation already, what is the benefit, for both the platform itself and the users doing so, to adding direct liquidity to the platform?
In practice, will this be similar to adding liquidity to Uniswap…and carry the same IL risk that Uniswap does?
AJ
The users get to earn ZEE tokens via liquidity mining, which is the backbone of the ZEE protocol, as we’ve seen Uniswap was and can be operational without their UNI token as well.
But for ZeroSwap the entire protocol is dependent on ZEE, and this is the largest moat for holding ZEE.
WC
Tell me a little more about the DEX Token Offering aspect of the platform. How does this differ to what seems like the now standard method of just straight launching a token on Uniswap?
Or the more old school (old as in a month or two old…haha) method of using a curve based platform like Mesa?
AJ
DEX token offering platform is a platform for participating in initial token offering on ZeroSwap
Users will be able to buy tokens, and it will provide a fair opportunity for them to participate in the initial offering. We will have an algorithm operating underline to manage this.
By using the DTO companies can list their tokens at zero cost.
WC
Say I’m a project and I want to launch my token on ZeroSwap. What’s the actual process for doing so?
I know the docs say it’s zero cost, but can I do it independently or is this something I have to contact ZeroSwap about and get approval for?
AJ
We will reveal this entire process of listing tokens on ZeroSwap DTO as soon as the platform is live…for now it’s coming soon!
ZEE TOKEN UTILITY
WC
We briefly touched upon some of the ZEE token utility in the previous questions, but how about you give me a bullet point summary of the various use cases within the ZeroSwap ecosystem?
AJ
ZEE tokens will have primarily 4 utilities -
- Liquidity Mining — Liquidity providers are stakeholders in a protocol, users who pool in liquidity to the DEXes which are aggregated on ZeroSwap will be Rewarded.
- DeX Token Offering — ZEE token will be used to enable projects to launch tokens through Dex Token Offering on ZeroSwap, it also allows ZEE holders to participate in an initial offering. Where centralised platforms today require projects to pay hefty fees and go through a centralised screening process, our vision is that we can offer a simple platform where anyone can distribute their tokens and have a ready exchange for it. This has its market risks in terms of violating securities laws and scams emerging. We will be issuing a reputation model into the project to avert that. One way the token could come into use is for staking against the reputation for token listings.
- Governance — ZEE holders will be empowered to govern the ZeroSwap protocol changes over time.
- Transaction Fee mining — Lastly, the underlying token could be used for transactions on the exchange itself.
WC
The liquidity mining aspect is REALLY interesting to me, I know you mentioned it earlier but maybe it didn’t sink in…does this mean if I supply liquidity to Uniswap for example (if you’re aggregating that) I’ll be rewarded with ZEE tokens?
AJ
Yes, you will be rewarded to supply liquidity to existing AMM’s.
WC
Wow, that is an alpha leak and a half!
ZEROSWAP REVENUE MODEL
WC
That’s probably a really good segue into how all these token mechanics work to serve ZeroSwap itself, past the users of the network.
So what’s the revenue model past selling ZEE tokens and how do the aforementioned token mechanics work into the model?
AJ
We will have more revenue models though tools we build around Zero Protocol.
DTO and the market making suite will have dependency on ZEE tokens.
In the future we want to provide gasless transactions for lending as well via ZeroLend.
So when we expand our horizon to more DeFi protocols, we will start creating value accrual for ZEE tokens.
PARTNERSHIPS & BACKERS
WC
Who are the major supporters of the project?
Do you have any fund names or notable individuals standing behind and supporting ZeroSwap?
AJ
We have raised funds from many strategic investors and angels, Alphabit, TRG Capital, AU21, GenBlock Capital, M6 etc.
We will soon announce the final results of our fundraising campaign.
WC
Now we touched on it a couple of times before, but I see you’ve recently partnered with Frontier, what’s the context of that partnership?
AJ
Frontier is the largest DeFi protocol aggregator and with this partnership we will be able to offer ZeroSwap fatures to a much wdier userbase.
Frontier users will be able to trade using ZeroSwap, stake ZEE tokens and to participate in DTO offerings, all via the Frontier application.
COMPETITORS
WC
I mentioned a couple of DEX aggregators earlier, like Paraswap and 1inch, that could be considered competitors to ZeroSwap…however the competitive landscape is actually much bigger than that, if you take other DEX’s and swap platforms into account.
Where do you see ZeroSwap’s market fit among all these DEX’s and who do you consider your true competitors in the space?
AJ
To be honest, our entire focus is on users and the user experience.
We believe that if we are able to solve pain points of on-chain trade, the ever soaring gas costs and protocol-fees, while offering a better UX, we will be way ahead of the curve.
WC
Your litepaper provides a breakdown of the different features between ZeroSwap and some other DEX platforms…let me just post that here…
Uniswap has progressed a bit since then hey!
AJ
Yes, that’s a comparison we pasted on our litepaper —
When we started our protocol, Uniswap didn’t have token or governance.
As we’ve mentioned already, we are not in competition with anyone, we are simply providing gasless transactions and zero-fee trades vs all other names that you mentioned.
ZEE TOKEN SALE & SUPPLY
WC
Before we get into the full details of your TGE, can you data dump on me the ZEE token metrics please?
AJ
We have raised 6000 ETH.
1000 ETH at a SEED price of 0.0001 ETH per ZEE
3700 ETH at Private 1 price of 0.000185 per ZEE
1300 ETH at Private 2 price of 0.00026 per ZEE
WC
Wow, that’s a LOT of ETH raised. Did you successfully raise the full amount in all tranches?
AJ
Yes we have raised the entire amount in all tranches.
Now the question is why raise in ETH?
Because we are bootstraping some of the ETH initially for gasless transactions on ZeroSwap.
WC
So I heard through the crypto grapevine you might be having a small public sale to finish off your raise…is this true?
AJ
We will have a public distribution.
WC
When will this be happening and on what platform? How will users be able to participate in this process?
AJ
We will soon announce all the details announce on our social channels.
WC
To save me from having to do the math myself, based on the above figures, what is your day one starting market cap?
AJ
It is around $1.1m USD initial market cap.
WC
When can we expect a listing and on what platform?
AJ
We will be going to market within this month. We are definitely in favour of CEX as we need more and more on-chain volume for our ZEE token.
DUE DILIGENCE CHECKS
WC
Does ZeroSwap have a Github?
AJ
Yes —
Most of our code is now closed source. We will soon open-source it to the public before the protocol launch.
WC
Where are you guys based?
AJ
As we already mentioned, we are mostly in India.
We have a few developers from Europe joining us soon too.
WC
Where is ZeroSwap incorporated?
AJ
ZeroSwap’s token entity is registered in BVI and we have a Singapore entity for equity.
We also have an Indian Entity where all the development work happens.
WC
Do you have a legal opinion that your ZEE token isn’t a security?
AJ
Definitely, yes.
We have received the legal opinion from a reputable firm from Singapore.
WC
Has the ZEE token already been minted?
If so, what’s the address?
AJ
Not yet.
We will unveil the contract address 2–3 days before the TGE.
Our token contract audits are already done and we are ready to deploy.
We just have to set up the multisig and deploy the token and vesting contracts.
WC
Has the ZEE smart contract been audited and can we see the results?
AJ
It’s audited by PeckShield for now.
We tried really hard to get another audits, but most audit firms are booked for next one month. LOL
CLOSING THOUGHTS
WC
Well that’s everything I have to ask for now, thank you so much for your time today and the comprehensive answers to all my questions…and of course for the leaked Alpha along the way!
It sounds like there’s a LOT more of that to come and of course we’ll keep our community updated with it as it’s leaked along the way!
AJ
Yes, there is indeed a lot to come, for now let me get back to #building!
ZeroSwap Resources
Website: https://zeroswap.io
Telegram: https://t.me/zeroswap
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ZeroSwapLabs
Medium: https://medium.com/zeroswaplabs
Litepaper: https://docsend.com/view/m4brpx32t73x5mkd
Wolf Crypto Resources
Public Group: https://t.me/WolfCryptoPub
News Channel: https://t.me/WolfCryptoAnnounce
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WolfCryptoGroup
