Original | Odaily Planet Daily

Author | Kate

With a Favorable Wind, I Ascend to the Sky

In 2024, it is destined to be an extraordinary year for Bitcoin and its ecosystem.

Since last year, Mingwen has led the Bitcoin ecosystem to set sail; in January of this year, the approval of the Bitcoin spot ETF injected a shot in the arm into the market; this month, with the price of BTC surpassing the $70,000 mark, people are once again confident in the historical trend of price increase after halving; 23 days later (expected on April 21), the halving will reduce the block reward from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC, triggering a demand shock.

While Bitcoin's halving has attracted much attention, its ecosystem projects may also receive overflow value in BTC. A group of high-quality projects are also closely eyeing the opportunity of the halving, releasing major updates and gearing up for growth.

In this article, Odaily Planet Daily will take stock of the hot projects in the BTC ecosystem and their recent major moves, so that readers can make early layouts and seize the initiative.

Merlin Chain - Unlocking Staked Assets

As a hot BTC L2 project, the TVL of the Bitcoin native Layer 2 network Merlin Chain reached a peak of $29.04 million in March (according to DefiLama data).

On February 28, Merlin Chain conducted the staking event "Merlin's Seal," through which users could accumulate M points by staking various assets to obtain Merlin Chain's governance token $MERL. The governance token $MERL rewarded in this staking event accounted for 20% of the total supply, reportedly the highest staking reward ratio among all Layer 2 projects. On March 19, the Bitcoin Layer 2 network Merlin Chain announced the official launch of M-Token, a token generated by users' staked tokens in Merlin Chain, used to experience products, interact with protocols in the Merlin Chain ecosystem, improve asset utilization, and witness ecosystem development.

The staked assets of users participating in Merlin's Seal are expected to be unlocked in April, at which time users can unlock the original staked assets by destroying the corresponding mapped assets M-Token. At that time, M-Token can be exchanged 1:1 for the original assets.

At the same time, according to official staff (@cyy7025219), the MERL token is planned to undergo a release before the halving in April.

Stacks - Nakamoto Upgrade

Stacks is the smart contract layer on Bitcoin, with its initial version launched in 2021, backed by long-term support from top-tier capital. The community has always been building with a long-term mindset. With continuous accumulation, its ecosystem has begun to show promise, with TVL increasing month by month, reaching a peak of over $170 million (according to DefiLama data).

The most exciting news for Stacks this year should be the Nakamoto Upgrade. After the upgrade, Stacks will significantly increase its speed, reducing block time to 5 seconds (currently about 10 to 30 minutes), and will support sBTC.

Stacks opened the Nakamoto testnet to the public on March 26. Previously, Stacks co-founder Muneeb Ali stated that the Stacks Nakamoto upgrade will begin to roll out between April 15 and 29. The necessary guiding contracts for the Nakamoto upgrade are ready.

The Nakamoto upgrade expected in Q2 will generate faster blocks, further enhance security, and is expected to significantly improve the DeFi experience, attracting more liquidity.

B²Network - Mainnet Launch

B²Network is a Layer 2 solution on Bitcoin, mainly utilizing zero-knowledge proof to submit commitments to the Bitcoin network, allowing challengers to initiate fraud proofs to utilize the strong consensus of the Bitcoin network to ensure the security of B²Network. Leading investors such as HashKey Capital, OKX Venture, and Shuidi Capital have explicitly stated that 10% of the token rewards will be used to incentivize early users, with 5% as mining rewards and another 5% to be distributed in the form of airdrops.

In early February, B²Network launched the user incentive activity "B²Buzz," where users could deposit assets in the three days before the mainnet launch to obtain parts for assembling mining machines, which can mine the native B² token. During the activity, all funds were managed securely through multi-signature methods. According to official information (to be verified), part production will end on March 31. Bridge assets can be withdrawn back to the first-layer network in April 2024.

The mainnet is expected to launch on April 3.

BounceBit - Mainnet Launch

BounceBit is a DeFi solution designed specifically for the Bitcoin ecosystem, powered by AUCTION and based on BTCB. This solution adopts an asset-centric strategy, with the core asset being BTCB, a BEP2/BEP20 asset pegged 1:1 to Bitcoin and locked on the Bitcoin blockchain. By leveraging the widespread familiarity of Binance users and the intuitively designed BNB chain, BounceBit significantly reduces the adoption threshold for users. This approach opens up a more accessible path for wider participation and investment in the crypto ecosystem.

BounceBit plans to launch the testnet in March, the mainnet on April 23, and conduct an airdrop in May, while also opening BounceBit point redemption and asset withdrawal functions.

Runes - Mainnet Launch and Large-scale Airdrop

Runes, also known as Bitcoin Runes, is a proposal by Casey Rodamor, the creator of the Ordinals protocol. Runes aims to provide a user-friendly, UTXO-based alternative for existing tokenization protocols such as Ordinals, ORC-20, BRC-20, and Stamps. Runes are unique, replaceable tokens existing on the Bitcoin blockchain, intended to represent replaceable assets with unique characteristics and metadata.

Previously, Casey stated at a blockchain event in Taipei that the Runes protocol mainnet will go live at Bitcoin block height 840,000, which is expected to be around late April. Interestingly, this may be a prelude to the mainnet launch. On March 26, Casey posted on X platform, stating that if the Runes ecosystem does not reach a market value of $1 billion in the first month after going live, he is prepared to commit seppuku, sparking discussion among netizens.

The projects in the Runes ecosystem are also taking advantage of this momentum, hoping to generate some heat. The Runes Chinese community has listed a list of projects to pay attention to. Odaily introduces two relatively popular projects here:

List link: https://twitter.com/RunesCN/status/1768177337261297808

• Runecoin (@rune_coin)

A large-scale airdrop of RSIC, holding RSIC will receive a reward of Runes tokens, with significant trading volume.

• Runestone 符文石（@LeonidasNFT）

Recently gaining high popularity, it is about to conduct a large-scale airdrop.

On March 9, the largest Ordinals inscription Runestone was successfully auctioned for 8 BTC ($544,713). Its creator, the well-known Ordinals influencer Leonidas, stated, "All proceeds from the auction and the 2.25 BTC previously raised through Twitter donations in the industry will be used to pay for the network fees of the Runestone airdrop plan, the largest-scale Ordinals airdrop in history is about to begin."

With the highly anticipated Bitcoin halving approaching, who will once again stir up the heat in the BTC ecosystem is worth continuous attention.

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