Cross-chain DeFi about to explode? Polkadot to Ethereum bridge

Polkadot may soon be tapping into Ethereum’s DeFi billions with a cross-chain bridge. A new project building on Polkadot wants to enable smart contracts on Ethereum to directly interact with Polkadot’s ecosystem and vice-versa. Snowfork aims to create a bridge that will let users trustlessly transfer tokens, loans, derivatives, or any other asset between the two networks.

A catalyst moment for wider DeFi adoption?

Many analysts believe blockchains that can interact with each other easily are the future. Hundreds of crypto project have several pages of their roadmap dedicated to creating interoperability. Ideally, it can lead to the development of DeFi protocols on separate networks that can read data from one another. For example, you could take out a loan on Aave but then repay it in Polkadot’s DeFi ecosystem, perhaps (in the future!) via Akropolis.

Understanding the value… Most interoperability solutions focus on moving tokens from one blockchain to another. The Snowfork bridge has a unique angle that many teams have not yet attempted for cross-chain bridges. They aim to also enable the transfer of loans, non-fungible tokens, derivative contracts, and any other asset. This means DeFi users could easily jump from one protocol to another, no matter the platform or network.

• The new ecosystem of Polkadot builders, such as Ankr or Dock, stands to benefit immensely from Ethereum’s billions of dollars in permissionless liquidity.

Zoom out: The Snowfork team has not yet released a proof of concept, but this should be coming mid-September. If successfully, the final release of the bridge is scheduled for March 2021. Keep your eyes peeled for announcements!