Liqwid

Liqwid Finance operates as a non-custodial, open-source liquidity protocol built on the Cardano blockchain, facilitating decentralized lending and borrowing. The platform, developed by Liqwid Labs, enables users to supply their Cardano native assets to earn interest and to borrow assets against their collateral without intermediaries. The protocol was conceptualized in September 2020 by co-founders who met through Project Catalyst, Cardano's community-driven innovation platform, and officially launched on the Cardano mainnet on February 2nd, 2023, after 2.5 years of development.

The founding team includes CEO Dewayne Cameron and Co-founder Florian Volery. Cameron's background includes roles as a consultant at MFR Consultants Inc. before co-founding Liqwid Labs. Volery brings extensive experience from the financial services and venture capital sectors, having worked at firms like EY and MTIP AG, and holds a Master of Science in Accounting, Controlling, and Finance. The development of Liqwid Labs is driven by a team of Haskell and TypeScript software engineers.

The business model centers on creating decentralized money markets through smart contracts. Users, referred to as lenders or suppliers, deposit their assets into liquidity pools and in return mint interest-bearing qTokens. These qTokens, pegged 1:1 to the underlying asset, accrue interest in real-time and can be used as collateral to borrow other assets instantly with no trading fees or slippage. Revenue for the protocol is generated from the interest paid by borrowers. Liqwid's architecture is built upon Cardano's Plutus smart contract language and eUTxO model, which ensures secure and cost-effective transactions. The platform's smart contracts have undergone an audit by Vacuumlabs.

A central component of the ecosystem is the LQ token, which has a fixed supply of 21 million. LQ token holders govern the protocol through a Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO), allowing them to vote on proposals for protocol upgrades and changes. Staking LQ tokens provides users with voting power and earns them staking rewards, which are derived from a percentage of the protocol's revenue and liquidation profits. The protocol also features "Lombard loans," enabling users to borrow against their staked ADA without sacrificing their staking rewards.

Keywords: decentralized finance, DeFi, Cardano, lending protocol, borrowing protocol, liquidity pool, smart contracts, non-custodial, crypto lending, yield farming, Dewayne Cameron, Florian Volery, LQ token, DAO, eUTxO, Plutus, blockchain finance, digital asset lending, crypto-backed loans, peer-to-peer lending, interest rate protocol, qTokens, liquid staking, Lombard loans, crypto collateral