Lightning Labs releases Taproot Assets alpha, bringing stablecoins to Bitcoin

cointelegraph.com:

Bitcoin layer-2 infrastructure firm Lightning Labs has released the mainnet alpha of Taproot Assets, a protocol aimed at enabling stablecoins and real-world assets to be issued on the Bitcoin and Lightning Network.

The current version, Taproot Assets v0.3, will provide a “feature-complete developer experience” to issue, manage and explore stablecoins and other assets on the Bitcoin blockchain, according to Ryan Gentry, head of business development at Lightning Labs.

“With this release, developers can issue financial assets on-chain in a scalable manner,” Lightning Labs stated on Oct. 18 in a separate post. “Today marks a new era of multi-asset bitcoin.”

Announcing the first mainnet release of Taproot Assets , a protocol for assets on #bitcoin and Lightning.

With this release, developers can issue financial assets on-chain in a scalable manner.

Today marks a new era of multi-asset bitcoin. https://t.co/2cNvZSvv8v

This version of Taproot Assets will work by routing through existing Bitcoin (BTC) liquidity on the Lightning Network.

Gentry says the integration will extend Bitcoin’s network effects and move it one step closer toward “bitcoinizing the dollar.” He added:

Gentry described developer demand for stablecoin applications on Bitcoin as “overwhelming,” particularly given that some stablecoin issuers hold more United States Treasurys than the likes of Germany and South Korea.

The future we deserve#bitcoin https://t.co/XW433TVEIL

“[It] signifies the importance of these assets globally, and gives a sense of scale for the global user demand,” Gentry added.

Related: BitVM wasn’t created to make Bitcoin a pseudo-Ethereum, says developer

Nearly 2,000 Taproot Assets were minted on testnets over the last several months in the