“Interchain swaps is the next DeFi narrative,” THORchain enthusiast asserts

Following his pitch to SushiSwap to adopt THORChain as its backend, DAO Times reached out to the creator of the proposal, TreefeedXavier. Xavier, an avid supporter of THORChain, believes that SushiSwap could gain a significant advantage over its competitors by embracing THORChain-powered cross-chain swaps for Layer 1 coins.

In this interview, we probed into Xavier’s ties with THORChain, why he chose SushiSwap for his proposal, and the possible impact of implementation.

crypto-scenes-and-when-did-you-discover-thorchain">You describe yourself as a “representer of THORChain community,” suggesting that you are an avid supporter of THORChain. Are you affiliated with the THORChain team? How long have you been in the crypto scenes and when did you discover THORChain?

The first thing people should know about THORChain: there is nothing official or approved in it. Except code. The core team is anonymous (pseudonymous), as the 9R (nine realms) team - both of them work on the implementation of the THORChain blockchain. Everything else - front-ends development, marketing, proposals, and community moderation is on voluntarism.

That allows pure decentralization - anybody can join and make an effort. So do I. I’m not in the core team, but support THORChain as a memes creator and moderator in the Cyrilyc community. With a few cryptonysts, we started a self-helping society in Q3 of 2018 with the main idea of discovering some gems. One of our members proposed THORChain at the very beginning - nothing had been done yet: only RUNE token on BEP2 and vault for staking. Crazy idea to invest, but we believed in the whitepaper, so we are here.

According to your proposal, SushiSwap could become the first major DEX provider to offer cross-chain swaps without wrapping assets. ShapeShift has been offering a similar service since 2021, and many relatively smaller players have entered the market since then. Will SushiSwap’s rollout be any different from other service providers? How do you think SushiSwap can differentiate itself?

I won’t upset ShapeShift and Erik Voorhees personally - he is a famous and respected member of the THORChain community from the very beginning and his wallet is one of the best - but stress here is on major DEX. SushiSwap is well known far beyond the english crypto area, users from many countries interact with it every day. Partnership with such DEX can increase awareness about THORChain. And moreover - usage of THORChain: we are OK with being hidden behind curtains of different front-ends, bringing interchain swaps to the World.

Need to know - it will work both ways: SushiSwap can be first out of major market players, who offer to customers interchain swaps. I also made the same proposal to 1inch - a famous aggregator. Who will be first, can beat competitors. So, do not lag behind.

In terms of trading volume, SushiSwap is currently behind others like dYdX and Uniswap. Are you confident that implementing THORChain as a back end could be a game-changer for SushiSwap? Are there any potential downsides to this implementation?

Partially, I have answered this in a previous question - yes, SushiSwap can gain an impressive advantage over competitors, if they consider a proposal (sooner rather than later). THORChain is open to partnering with anyone - if dYdX or Uniswap want to discuss it, they are welcome: Twitter, Discord, or Telegram - reach any moderator and they lead you further.

THORChain is a new technology, never been tried before - of course, there can be lags and risks in implementation. But the Core team and 9R did a great job that is battle-tested by the market and survived the second crypto winter in a row. And more wide usage could help improve it even better: more devs involved from different areas, more stability for all-needed-technology. Interchain swaps is the next DeFi narrative.

THORChain has been around since 2018. It is quite surprising that the idea to implement THORChain as a backend is just springing up, given its enormous potential. Why do you think this is so? Are crypto projects oblivious to the capabilities of THORChain?

THORChain had been born in the middle of the crypto winter and rose well during the bull run, but, as I said, it is a project in an unknown area: some hacks, lack of working hands and, maybe, even too rapid start undermined it. But these circumstances made THORChain stronger: now we have 9R - they are constantly working on security audits. Community grows, many side projects become autonomous e.g. xDefi wallet - I personally replaced Metamask with it as a more comfortable alternative.

But all these changes are visible only when you looking into THORChain ecosystem constantly. As I mentioned before - marketing is on community and decentralized. It is good from side of impressive ideas that no need to approve, but on the other hand, we lack vector. I mean, sometimes we need to crawl out of our shell and remind other projects that THORChain still exists and can become even stronger. I hope the community follows my role model and will start communicating with other crypto areas.

Members of the SushiSwap forum appear to have bought into your idea. What are the next steps if your proposal gets passed?

Actually, everything is ready for implementation and if you visit THORSwap (most used THORChain front-end) - you will find that interchain swaps aggregation already works. Funny thing: sometimes for BTC-USDC, the swap aggregator offers swaps for BTC to ETH in THORChain pools, but for ETH to USDC, it uses Uniswap pool because it is cheaper for the user. Only thing any THORChain partner need to - is to adopt this feature for its interface.

This month one of 9R members Pluto(9R) will release THORChain aggregator proof-of-concept, which could be used as starting model for anybody.