In the coming weeks, the platform plans to add Arbitrum and BNB Chain, and it is changing some aspects of how tokens are rewarded and distributed
Developers wrote on Thursday that Trader Joe, a decentralized exchange (DEX) on the Avalanche blockchain, has plans to increase the utility of its native governance token JOE and other ecosystem tokens.
Once the DEX is operational on Arbitrum and BNB Chain, two additional blockchain networks, developers intend to bridge JOE tokens. On these networks, the governance token JOE will be used, and each JOE will be equivalent to one vote in Trader Joe’s governance forums, where platform holders can suggest and choose strategies or improvements for the future.
Through staked joe (sJOE), a token given to users who supply JOE to the DEX in exchange for rewards, Trader Joe also intends to offer stakes a share of the trading fees that are earned on the DEX.
Trader Joe stakers will be able to receive a share of trading fees for all chains, including Avalanche, Arbitrum, and Binance, as part of the launch of version 2 which is anticipated in February. However, such fee rewards are currently only available on version 1 of the platform. The 1% sJOE deposit fee will continue.
As of Friday, Trader Joe’s was one of the largest DEX and lending services on Avalanche, holding tokens worth more than $88 million. CoinDesk reported that the platform previously announced its move to Arbitrum in December, marking its first deployment on a separate network.
According to DeFiLlama data, the DEX still attracts the highest transactional volumes among all Avalanche-based products and captured $2.5 billion in locked value at its lifetime peak in 2021.
The launch will see the introduction of Trader Joe’s Liquidity Book, a product that says it will make DEX trading more efficient by reducing slippage and increasing capital efficiency.
Vote-escrowed JOE (veJOE) holders will be eligible to receive “boosted” JOE rewards as part of the Liquidity Book Rewards program, which is expected to launch in February. However, these rewards will continue to only be available on Avalanche.
Users were able to lock their veJOE tokens on Trader Joe’s for a greater yield in exchange for participating in a rewards program that included these tokens. Trader Joe’s was able to increase its liquidity while maintaining user incentives by doing so.
In the meantime, the Rocket Joe program, which was intended to provide liquidity for brand-new Avalanche products, will be discontinued.
According to the developers, “Since mid-2022 Rocket Joe has not blasted off, and this raises the question around the use-case for rJOE staking.” The Decentralized Exchange’s 2023 direction calls for the deprecation of rJOE staking. This decision is now in effect, and rJOE staking will no longer accept new JOE deposits.
As a token of appreciation for their participation, each staker of rJOE will receive one commemorative non-fungible token (NFT).
