Libra Credit is a decentralized lending ecosystem that facilitates open access to credit anywhere and anytime based on the Ethereum blockchain. Libra Credit is a global initiative with a mission to provide financial inclusion and lower the cost of financial services. Powered by its proprietary big data, AI-based credit assessment technology and existing global partnership networks, Libra Credit has the expertise and capabilities to realize its mission. Libra Credit aims to offer a seamless digital lending process that can be completed in 5 steps: application, verification and credit assessment, confirmation, collateral deposit, and disbursement. The Libra Credit platform will focus on a dual-credit risk scoring mechanism that considers the creditworthiness of the pledged collateral as well as the credit information of the borrower. Borrowers will be able to pledge any crypto-assets as collateral and receive loans in their desired asset. Using smart contracts and a proprietary collateral valuation and liquidation system, Libra Credit will lock in agreed terms between borrows, lenders, custodians, guarantors and liquidators. Libra Credit was founded in 2017 and operates out of San Francisco, USA. They are backed by investors such as FBG Capital, GBIC, DHVC, Dekypt Capital, Crypto Parency, and others. Lu Hua, Co-Founder & CEO has experience in the payments, financing, and risk management industries. He was previously the CEO of moKredit, one of China’s top digital credit servicing companies. Lu was also the Head of Core Payments for PayPal China and the Head of Global Banking Platform for PayPal US. Dan Schatt, Co-Founder & COO has previously worked as the Chief Commercial Officer at Stockpile Inc., a leading fintech company, and as General Manager of Financial Innovations at PayPal. Howard Wu, Chief Scientist, he is a blockchain and cryptography expert who is a Founding Partner of Dekrypt Capital, Advisor of Blockchain at Berkeley, and Software Engineer at Google. He advises the project in a technical capacity and has received a Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences from UC Berkeley. There are already quite a few blockchain lending projects, so competition is stiff. Libra Credit’s development progress is rather early compared to its competitors. The crypto-to-crypto lending part seems to be well thought out. However, not so much with the crypto-to-fiat part. According to the roadmap, crypto-to-fiat lending is scheduled to launch in 2018 Q3. With details lacking in the weekly blog update about crypto-to-fiat lending, it is difficult to gauge whether the proposed timeline is reasonable.
Tezos is a coin created by a former Morgan Stanley analyst, Arthur Breitman. It is a smart contract platform which is does not involve in mining Tezos coins. It is a coin that promotes themselves on major ideas of self-amendment and on-chain governance. It is an Ethereum-like blockchain that hosts smart contracts. It allows the community to vote and improve its flaws. Any token holder may delegate their voting rights to others in the network. The coin uses a generic network shell which allow different transaction and consensus protocols that a blockchain needs to be compatible. The source code is implemented on OCaml which is a fast, flexible and functional programming language which should suit an ambitious project and its technical requirements. Tezos’ proof-of-stake consensus algorithm is different from the delegated proof-of-stake (dPOS) where they go by the name liquid proof-of-stake. This liquid proof-of-stake that Tezos uses focus in filling the gap between both security and decentralization but still being able to take advantage of the benefits that delegated proof-of-stake offers. The staking process in Tezos is called “baking”. In this blockchain, bakers who make deposits will be rewarded for signing up and publishing blocks. However, if a baker commits any bad behavior the deposits will be forfeited. Baking & Endorsing Baking is what Tezos refers to as the action of signing and publishing a new block in the chain. Bakers need at least 10,000 XTZ to qualify as a delegate, and having additional delegated stake increases their chances of being selected as a Baker or Endorser. At the beginning of each cycle (4096 blocks), the Bakers for each block are randomly selected and published. Bakers earn a block reward of 16 XTZ for baking a block. In addition to the Baker, 32 Endorsers are randomly selected to verify the last block that was baked. Endorsers receive 2 XTZ for each block they endorse. Block Rewards & Inflation Block rewards are funded by protocol defined inflation. Rewards are calibrated so that the number of XTZ tokens grows at roughly 5.5% per year. If 100% of Tezos tokens are delegated, the annualized yield will be 5.5%. Currently, 38% of Tezos tokens have been delegated, including the 10% owned by the Tezos Foundation, so the annualized yield is currently 14%. To ensure Bakers and Endorsers act honestly, they are required to post a security deposit for each block they Bake or Endorse. They forfeit this deposit in the event of malicious activity, such as double baking or double endorsing a block. In 2018, Tezos successfully launched their main network after delaying the launch due to corporate governance disputes. The Tezos foundation planned to transition the network to a mainnet, or a more complete version. The foundation has also raised $232 million in July 2017 to build the network and issue a new type of cryptocurrency to its backers in one of the largest- ever initial coin offerings. The founders have also made it clear in their blog that the network is using a new blockchain technology hence unexpected issues may still occur affecting the network. Check out CoinBureau for the complete review of Tezos.