With the launch of a new token, ETHtez (ETHtz), we hereby confidently and audaciously proclaim the beginning of a path that will lead to the erosion of Ethereum’s dominance in the DeFi space. We profess that the Tezos token standard ‘FA’ will supplant the Ethereum token standard ‘ERC’ for major DeFi assets and that even Ethereum’s own native currency, Ether (ETH), will increasingly be traded by proxy through this Tezos-based token.

The ETHtz contract launch was first announced on Twitter:

On Saturday, December 12th 2020, at Block 1255824 we launched Ethertez (Symbol: ETHtz / ETHTZ) @ETH_Tez #Tezos https://t.co/Wpn5jjqdRBhttps://t.co/wU8n7mGmQDhttps://t.co/3dlB2PZ3vuhttps://t.co/nhpvwBBz4ihttps://t.co/BDBoDRevkG

We believe that the predominantly (as of the date of this article) Ethereum-based DeFi trading market will move to the Tezos DeFi ecosystem for very practical financial reasons, and that ETHtz will be a key gateway for this movement.

Why ETH DeFi traders will switch to Tezos DeFi

Back in May 2020, we announced the first USD stablecoin on Tezos — USDtez (Symbol: USDtz) — and that USDtz would be the first of a network of Tezos stablecoins called ‘StableTez’ to support an asset layer for Tezos DeFi.

USDtz is being traded through Dexter.exchange and will soon be traded on Quipuswap.com. Both of these exchanges are Automated Market Makers (AMMs) like Uniswap on Ethereum.

Also over the course of 2020, Ethereum based DeFi has come to prosper, with over 15 billion dollars in Total Value Locked, and with the price of Ether (ETH) valued at over $500 dollars once again.

Ethereum deserves praise for a lot of things, but not this. It is still a proof of work network and there's nothing iterative about launching a massive overall as a separate chain after years of development. Proof of stake and iterative is Tezos' hallmark.

Despite Ethereum’s accomplishments and its ongoing “Ethereum 2.0 upgrade,” the platform still lacks essential fundamentals that would make it an adequate platform for traders and investors to participate in a much more scaled DeFi landscape. Namely, these failures concern (though many more criticisms can be made) the lack of on-chain governance which is necessary to prevent hard-forks (i.e. fragmentation), as well as what is most immediately pressing for traders which are the escalating price of gas fees for Ethereum transactions.

Tezos blockchain, however, has been advancing on all fronts of what the future of a DeFi-suited platform should be — most recently and notably dropping the price of gas fees with Tezos’ Delphi upgrade.

A transaction on Tezos now costs not even 1% the cost of a similar transaction on Ethereum.

Whenever Ethereum gas prices spike, DeFi traders (and their billions of dollars traded daily) will need a cost-effective alternative outlet for trading:

1. Even if that alternative outlet is used temporarily until Ethereum gas prices fall down again
2. Even if they have no immediate intention of adopting a new DeFi ecosystem
3. Even if just to cost-effectively trade on the price of Ether (ETH) itself

Criticisms and responses:

Ethereum fans may be dismissive of such a prediction.

Criticism 1: One criticism may be that the aforementioned attractiveness would only last as long as the intermittent gas surges last and that whenever Ethereum gas prices drop again, those traders will move back to Ethereum.

Answer: Although this may be true in at least some instances, even a majority of instances, it stands to reason that at least some traders will continue to prefer trading through Tezos after making the switch. Since we can assume Ethereum’s gas prices spike fairly regularly, each time this happens more and more Ethereum diaspora will stay on to Tezos for good.

Criticism 2: Some may say that there’s too much friction involved in collateralizing Ethereum assets for Tezos tokens and that that would diminish the attractiveness of Tezos as an alternative trading environment

Answer: Within a matter of weeks we will be launching “TEZEX: Bridge” — a platform for cross-blockchain atomic swaps akin to RenBridge or WBTC Cafe. Liquidity will be largely aided by minteries (Tezos bakers who enroll as minters of Tezos stablecoins), which will soon number in the dozens.

Criticism 3: Many will criticize Tezos’ lack of currently available yield-generation options. Although Dexter Exchange exists, offering liquidity pools, (and Quipuswap Exchange upon its launch will offer a similar solution) there are still no lending systems of Tezos like Compound or Aave.

Answer: StableTech will soon (Q1 ‘21) launch Tezos Finance “TezFin”; decentralized lending and borrowing platform (aka Automated Interest Rate Maker) on Tezos akin to Compound Finance or Aave. TezFin will enable floating-rate lending and borrowing of Tezos-based crypto-assets, as well as the ability to use lent Tezos-based asset deposits as collateral in order to borrow different Tezos-based assets.

ETHtez (ETHtz) Begins

Hence, we have developed a solution to begin the process of migrating billions of dollars of value from the Ethereum market. Just as we have been wrapping FIAT token currencies onto Tezos tokens, we have begun wrapping other cryptocurrencies too, starting with Ether (ETH) itself.

We’re calling this tool: ETHtz or more formally ETHtez

Contract address:

KT19at7rQUvyjxnZ2fBv7D9zc8rkyG7gAoU8

ETHtz went live on Tezos mainnet, on Saturday, December 12th, 2020. It was first publicly announced in a tweet.

ETHtz contract on Block Explorers: Better Call Dev, TzKT, Arronax, Tezblock, tzStats

Tezos wallets and block explorers with Tezos token support are now adding ETHtz listings. These will be the same wallets that currently support USDtz which can be observed here: https://usdtz.com/wallets.html

ETHtz will have accomodating liquidity pools for trading on Dexter Exchange, and Quipuswap Exchange coming up. These will be the same exchanges supporting USDtz, which can be found here: https://usdtz.com/exchanges.html

The available pools will include XTZ/ETHtz, and ETHtz/USDtz and more. ETHtz can be paired with any FA-standard token.

StableTez will soon follow up with the addition of BTCtz, EURtz, and will open the door to commodities with GLDtz.

More Information

About StableTez

ETHtez (ETHtz), like USDtez (USDtz), are part of a growing family of assets called ‘StableTez’. The ‘tez’ is the native currency of Tezos (what the token or ‘coin’ is called). Therefore, ‘StableTez’ serves a pseudo-portmanteau of the phase ‘Tezos Stablecoin’.

All stablecoin assets and respective contracts under the StableTez family of assets are to be governed by a wrapping governance StableTez governance token called by its symbol: SABZ

1. ETHtez website: https://ETHtz.io
2. USDtez website: https://USDtz.com
3. All Tezos Stablecoins (of the StableTez Suite): https://stabletez.com

StableTez expects to add more FIAT and Crypto backed assets, as well as commodity-backed assets including precious metals from https://Tezos.gold and agriculture from https://Tezos.coffee and https://Tezos.soy.

StableTez itself a project created for the benefit of the Tezos DeFi ecosystem, by StableTech (Tezos Stable Technologies, Ltd.) along with other Layer 1 Tezos DeFi projects including Tezos Exchange (TEZEX.io) and Tezos Finance (TezFin).

About StableTech (Tezos Stable Technologies, Ltd.)

The aforementioned projects are developed by multiple participants in the Tezos DeFi ecosystem, including Wealthchain, Inc., Cryptonomic, Inc., and TokenSoft, Inc. These institutions as well as their respective labor and resource contributions are coordinated by StableTech (Tezos Stable Technologies, Ltd.)

Twitter: https://twitter.com/StableTech

StableTech itself is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Tezos Stablecoin Foundation — which is a non-shareholder foundation.

About Tezos Stablecoin Foundation

Tezos Stablecoin Foundation (TSF)is a non-profit and non-shareholder foundation serving the cause of advancing DeFi on Tezos.

TSF’s seeks to achieve its mission goal in two ways:

1. Building the primordial (Layer 1) technologies that will enable the infrastructural functions and facilities of the Tezos DeFi ecosystem (e.g. Stablecoins, Trading, Lending). This is done through its aforementioned operative arm, StableTech, and is executed by StableTech’s coordinated independent entities.
2. Providing grant opportunities to Tezos developers and entrepreneurs seeking support and resources to innovate the Tezos DeFi ecosystem through independent initiatives.

In 2021, Tezos Stablecoin also plans to release a progenitive governance token (a ‘retro-token’) called the Trustee Network token (TRU) on Tezos — the holders of which will be the recipients of a proportional amount of SABZ as well as other governance tokens related to TSF/StableTech Tezos DeFi Layer 1 projects.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TezosStablecoin

Trustee Network: https://Trustee.Network

Introducing ETHtz for Tezos Trading was originally published in StableTech on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.