DeFi, payments, tokenization, Soroban, governance, and project launches — curated daily from publications, project blogs, and community channels across the Stellar blockchain ecosystem.
Etherfuse has launched Stablebonds on Stellar, tokenized government treasury bonds offering yield-bearing opportunities with low entry barriers. These RWAs leverage Stellar's low fees and global infrastructure to democratize access to the $140T bond market.
The Stellar Development Foundation announced that Ondo Finance's yield-bearing stablecoin USDY, backed by U.S. Treasuries and bank deposits, will launch on Stellar in the coming months. This expands Stellar's real-world asset ecosystem alongside issuers like Circle, Paxos, and Franklin Templeton.
The Stellar Development Foundation released its Q4 2024 report highlighting a transformative year with 18 billion network operations, $32 billion in payment volume, and significant ecosystem growth including 640% Soroban TVL expansion and Protocol 22 upgrade.
Tansu has successfully validated the first tranche of its Stellar Community Fund build Award, completing three key milestones for a decentralized organization (DAO) on Stellar. This includes a Soroban smart contract backend with DAO functionality, a matching frontend, and extensive maintenance work. Additional efforts focus on IPFS integration, design improvements, anonymous voting, and reducing external dependencies for true decentralization.
Balanced released its Q4 2024 update, highlighting launches on Stellar, Solana, and Optimism, alongside BALN cross-chain deployment across multiple blockchains including Stellar. Key achievements include intent-based trades between Arbitrum and Sui, smart contract audits, and preparations for cross-chain liquidity and Savings Rate. The DAO reported $82k in fees, with ongoing governance and economic enshrinement progress.
The Stellar Community Fund (SCF) Round 31 awarded $2,068,710 in XLM to 22 projects, including payment solutions, DeFi platforms, developer tools, and RWA tokenization engines. The round received 123 submissions, with 71 being first-time applicants, demonstrating strong ecosystem growth.
The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Stellar Development Foundation (SDF) announced a strategic partnership to leverage blockchain technology for financial inclusion and sustainable development. The collaboration will create scalable solutions for cross-border payments, remittances, humanitarian aid, and cash transfer programs in developing regions.
Stellar RPC, formerly known as Soroban RPC, has been rebranded with Protocol 22 to serve as the unified data access layer for all Stellar developers. The rename reflects the tool's broader applicability beyond smart contracts and positions it as the recommended entry point for new builders, moving away from the increasingly impractical Horizon infrastructure.
Reflector DAO has voted to add Lightsail and CreitTech as node providers, expanding its quorum to seven trusted participants. This decentralization strengthens Reflector's oracle infrastructure for providing secure price feeds to the Stellar ecosystem.
The Stellar Development Foundation published a comprehensive 2024 year-in-review highlighting major ecosystem achievements including the mainnet launch of Soroban smart contracts, expansion of DeFi protocols like Blend, integration of payment solutions with MoneyGram and Stripe, real-world asset adoption through Franklin Templeton and Paxos, and humanitarian aid initiatives through UNHCR partnerships.
Ghanaian fintech Seevcash integrated DeFindex's white-label DeFi yield infrastructure on Stellar in just one week, slashing development time from 12+ months and reducing code by 50%. Post-marketing, TVL spiked 433% to $13K with 24 active users earning yields on stablecoins. The SDK enabled gasless transactions via Stellar sponsorship, building trust in unbanked markets.
The Stellar Community Fund (SCF) #30 round awarded $2.17 million in XLM to 22 projects in the first round of SCF 6.0, including initiatives for DeFi, payments, humanitarian aid, NFTs, developer tools, and financial inclusion across the Stellar ecosystem.
Balanced, a cross-chain DeFi platform built on ICON, has launched on Optimism, its 5th Ethereum ecosystem chain. Users can now swap ETH and USDC for assets on other blockchains, transfer cross-chain, and borrow bnUSD using ETH as collateral. The platform leverages ICON's GMP for secure connections, including to Stellar.
A blog post exploring how programmable payments and blockchain technology could improve charitable aid distribution by reducing inefficiencies and human fallibility in philanthropy. The author argues that using Stellar's infrastructure for conditional, automated payments could enable more direct and traceable delivery of disaster relief and social programs.
This article explores how passkeys—a secure, user-friendly authentication method already adopted in Web2—are being integrated into Stellar's blockchain to improve user experience and drive adoption. Stellar gained a significant advantage by implementing native secp256r1 support in Protocol 21, enabling passkey functionality directly at the protocol level rather than through third-party solutions.
Balanced, a cross-chain DeFi app on ICON, has integrated Solana as its 11th blockchain connection, enabling users to swap SOL, transfer assets cross-chain, use SOL and JitoSOL as collateral to borrow bnUSD, and supply liquidity on ICON. This expands Balanced's reach to Solana's 5 million daily active users with audited smart contracts and low fees. The integration leverages ICON's GMP protocol, which also connects to Stellar and other chains.
A detailed recap of Meridian 2024's Dev Underground stage in London, where 80+ Stellar Community Fund winners pitched their projects over two days in a casual, collaborative environment. The article highlights standout projects, community collaborations, and the vibrant energy of builders across the Stellar ecosystem.
USDx stablecoin from FxDAO protocol is now live on Soroswap Finance, the first DEX on Soroban Blockchain, with a $190,000 TVL liquidity pool for the XLM/USDx pair. Users can issue USDx by locking Lumens as collateral in FxDAO vaults for liquidity without selling assets. The article guides on acquiring, swapping, and providing liquidity for USDx on Soroswap.
The Stellar Development Foundation released its Q3 2024 report highlighting major ecosystem milestones including 9 million network addresses, $5M+ in Enterprise and Matching Fund investments, and the launch of Stellar Community Fund 6.0. Key achievements include Franklin Templeton's Benji platform reaching $450M in supply, Protocol 22 development nearing completion, and expanded ecosystem integrations with Dune and DefiLlama.
This guide explains how Ghanaian users can withdraw stablecoins like USDC and USDT from Binance to Ghanaian Cedi via mobile money or bank accounts using Bingtellar. Bingtellar is a web3 payments platform that supports Stellar, Solana, and BEP20 networks for seamless conversions. It offers speed, convenience, security, and fair rates as key benefits.
Hana Wallet now integrates Soroswap, allowing users to easily swap Stellar tokens like XLM and USDC directly from their mobile devices. The article provides a step-by-step guide to installing Hana Wallet, setting it up for the Stellar network, and accessing Soroswap via the app's DApps directory. This enhances decentralized finance accessibility on the Soroban ecosystem without KYC requirements.
COCA Wallet's Q3 2024 recap highlights explosive growth with over 138,000 users, 600,000 wallets, and €750,000 in transaction volume. Key launches include physical debit cards, Revolut Pay and Stellar blockchain integrations for USDC/USDT top-ups, BASE chain support, and the world's first Solana-enabled MPC wallet. Community initiatives like the COCA Points program and meme competition drove strong engagement.
Empowch positions its blockchain-based digital wallet as a solution for NGOs delivering aid to Syrian and Lebanese refugees in the MENA region. The self-custody platform enables instant cross-border payments and cash conversion, reducing reliance on costly intermediaries and traditional banking infrastructure.
Blockaid has integrated its Onchain Detection and Response (ODR) security technology into Stellar's Lobstr and Freighter wallets, providing real-time threat monitoring and malicious transaction detection. This partnership marks the first deployment of Blockaid's Web3 security features on the Stellar blockchain.
zkCross Network announces Super Accounts on Stellar, powered by their Chain Abstraction Layer, enabling seamless 1-click cross-chain DeFi transactions without bridging or gas management. This integrates zkCrossDEX with Stellar's Soroban blockchain, supported by a Stellar Community Fund grant. The phased roadmap includes AMM DEX, staking, launchpad, and perpetuals trading.