Popular bitcoin exchange OKEx has announced the mainnet launch of its “high-performance trading chain” OKExChain for January of next year, across four main stages that will ensure the network’s security and reliability.
According to OKEx, OKExChain has been in development for “just under three years,” and went through three major phases on its journey to become “the robust, highly efficient trading chain” that it’s set to soon launch.
The development period it went through, OKEx wrote, allowed the team behind it to “better understand the specific advantages” of the technology being used on OKExChain and how it “improves on other existing projects.” The announcement adds:
What we’ve built over the last few years and will launch to the public in January is the world’s first open-source, trading-focused chain — a truly decentralized and borderless ecosystem for exchanging value.
It’s native OKExChain Token (OKT) will go through an initial minting process that will start near the end of the year. The blockchain’s mainnet itself will go through a genesis stage going from 4:00 pm UTC on Dec. 31, 2020 to 4:00 pm UTC on Jan. 14, 2021.
Its second stage will be used to test the network’s stability. The duration of the stage isn’t defined, as the exchange will coordinate with its community to “conduct a final test of the entire network to ensure the safety and reliability of the OKExChain.“
A third stage will start after the network’s validators proposed it. During this stage, users will be able to move their OKT tokens from OKEx onto the OKExChain. A final fourth stage will see the “smart contract virtual machine” be enabled after a proposal is passed by validators.
OKExChain will then be “compatible with all projects on Ethereum.”
Initial Minting Process for OKExChain’s OKT Token
According to a separate announcement the exchange published, the minting process will begin on December 31, 2020 at 4:00 pm UTC. OKB token holders will be able to stake their funds with OKEx to start earning OKExChain Tokens (OKT), which will be used on the OKExChain.
The OKEx Chain is a high-performance trading chain and the exchange describes it as the “next step in decentralized trading, allowing people to trade anything on-chain while retaining complete control over their assets. The announcement adds:
OKT is the native token of the OKExChain ecosystem and gives holders benefits which include staking privileges and voting rights. After the chain’s mainnet launch, OKT holders will also be able to become validators to earn block rewards and transaction fees.
OKT, it’s worth noting, has an initial minting of 10 million tokens and an upper supply limit of about 72.2 million. It uses the same halving model as BTC and is halved every three years. Initial block rewards are of 1 OKT.
