STRK price jumped 26% as the network named five institutions supporting Bitcoin movement into its DeFi ecosystem.
Starknet, an Ethereum Layer-2 network built around zero-knowledge technology, has announced a five-member Federation, a group of independent infrastructure signers that will support its strkBTC Bitcoin bridge.
The May 7 announcement named Twinstake, NEAR▼$1.98 Intents, Luganodes, UTXO and Xverse as the first institutions supporting strkBTC, a Bitcoin-backed asset on Starknet.
The network emphasized that the Federation would facilitate the minting, burning, and bridging of BTC▼$62,302.00 and strkBTC from launch.
After the news broke, Starknet’s native STRK token rose 26%, pushing its market capitalization to about $306 million, according to CoinGecko data.
Read also: Solv Protocol Drops LayerZero, Migrates $700M in Tokenized Bitcoin to Chainlink
STRK Gets a Bitcoin Story
With its strkBTC solution, Starknet wants to push Bitcoin beyond passive storage and utilize BTC within its DeFi protocols through borrowing, lending, and trading activities.
The project said strkBTC is designed to bring Bitcoin into Starknet DeFi with privacy built into the experience, framing the product as a way to make Bitcoin “private, productive, and usable across Starknet.”
Starknet says strkBTC adds optional privacy through Shielding, limiting visibility of balances and transactions while still allowing selective disclosure where required.
The Federation model is just the beginning stage for strkBTC, the announcement reads. Further phases will be based on post-quantum security, a BitVM design and finally an OP_CAT design which is based on the scripting solution for Bitcoin that may facilitate trustless bridge building.
Read more: Bitcoin Optimism Hits 4-Month High. Here’s Why That’s a Bad Sign
