Cronos Ecosystem Spotlight: Argo Finance
Today, we are excited to feature Argo Finance, the premier liquid staking protocol on Cronos with an Argonaut NFT collection.
Earlier in July, we kicked off the Cronos Ecosystem Spotlight Series — a series of interview articles covering projects that are building on the Cronos Chain.
Today, we are excited to feature Argo Finance, the premier $CRO liquid staking protocol on Cronos that features a popular NFT collection, Argonauts.
1. Please share more about Argo and the origin story of your project.
Argo Finance is a liquid staking protocol on Cronos, focused on bringing the benefits of liquid $CRO staking to the #Crofam.
With Argo Finance, users are able to stake their $CRO and receive $bCRO, which can be further used across other major protocols on Cronos to generate even more APR on top of native $CRO staking yields. Beyond that, users of $bCRO are also able to swap back to CRO instantly, bypassing the typically 28-day unbonding period. Talk about the best of both worlds!
Argo started off as a small idea — we saw a surge in the number of Proof-of-Stake L1s and of course, L1 tokens that when staked could not be used in DeFi and had long unstaking periods — It was clear there was a core need for liquid staking, none more so than on the newly minted Cronos chain. From there on there was no turning back — we were on a great journey, an odyssey — and no better name for our protocol than Argo to carry us through this journey.
In August 2022, we also introduced an NFT collection, Argonauts. The Argonauts will be the centerpiece of the Argo ecosystem that we will be building out on Cronos in the coming months and years. #BUIDL
2. Can you share with the community the background of the Argo team?
Fun fact: the Argo team has known each other for almost a decade now, and our common passion for web3 has brought us together again in the past year to Cronos and Argo.
The team members have all forged their own paths individually, coming from top companies within Big Tech and traditional finance. We are, however, bound by the same burning passion for web3 and the hunger to build something meaningful in the space. In the past 3 to 4 years, we have constantly spent our days scouring for new technologies, exploring multiple chains, and protocol-metas to learn and explore new ideas.
We eventually came together in a legendary reunion again and the rest is as you say, history. You all now know us as the team behind Argo, and we’re not going to stop till Argo is on top. All love to the #Crofam!
3. It has been a few months since Argo launched on Cronos, can you share with us how the experience has been?
It has been nothing short of exhilarating — the Cronos community has been nothing but welcoming. The team wakes up every day with gratitude and we couldn’t have chosen a better chain to launch our product on.
I speak for the team when I say this, many of our early partnerships have been instrumental to our success as a key product layer on Cronos — grants and technical support from the Cronos Labs team, strong partnerships with core protocols such as VVS, MMF, Mimas, Single Finance, Defira. We are still continuing to solidify more partnerships (shoutout to all the teams)
However, what we have been the most thankful for was the constant outpouring of love and support from the community — both thought leaders and users alike. You all know who you are #Argofam. It is with the Argo Family support that we have been able to bring Argo and the Argonauts to greater heights.
From launch to now, we’ve grown to become a household name on Cronos, trusted by users and other protocols alike. DeFi has gone through quite the year; We’ve all experienced hard times and made sacrifices but we’re here to build and bring both Argo and Cronos up and onwards!
4. Looks like Argonauts have become a key piece of your platform, can you share more about Argonauts?
You’re absolutely right, the Argonauts are a key piece of our platform.
The Argonauts collection grants holders access to partnerships, exclusive events, airdrops, exclusive minigames & rewards. Argo Finance and the Argonauts collection are symbiotic in nature — both contribute and coexist to bring extra utilities to each other, further strengthening the brand and ecosystem that we’re building. A quality community deserves quality artwork and there is no shortage of love for these adorable characters on Cronos.
Since launching in August 2022, we’ve released exclusive features for Argonauts — Lobby games, Argonauts Lottery, rewards partnerships with other protocols, and the Great Argonauts Odyssey. All of this in just a span of 2 months.
As exciting as that all is, this is just the beginning of the Argonauts ecosystem. What we’re really hyped for is the main course, which we have yet to reveal (More shall be said at the right time). The Argonauts are meant to bring DeFi and NFTs on Argo to the next level — and that is exactly what’s going to happen.
5. What are the upcoming roadmap updates for Argo and Argonauts that the Cronos community can look forward to?
Like we’ve said above, we’re hyped for the next stage of Argo and Argonauts. Phases 1 and 2 of the Argonauts brought us the integration of the Argonauts Lottery and Odyssey.
What the community can be really excited about are major developments surrounding Phase 3 to culminate our journey to Atlantis.
In between Phase 2 and 3, there are very exciting upcoming developments and partnerships happening soon.
The team is literally in the midst of building that out for the Argonauts. More information will be disclosed at the right time, but from the many sprint meetings and jamming sessions that we’ve had, the team is extremely excited as to what our community can look forward to in the coming months.
The more creative of you probably could figure it out, but why spoil the fun? You’ll find out more about it on our social pages. Watch this space #Crofam.
Follow Argo on:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ArgoProtocol
Discord: discord.gg/argofinance
About Cronos
Cronos (cronos.org) is the first EVM-compatible Layer 1 blockchain network built on the Cosmos SDK, supported by Crypto.com, Crypto.org, and more than 300+ app developers and partners. Cronos is building an open ecosystem where developers can create their own DeFi and GameFi applications, targeting a base of 50+ million users globally. Earlier this year, Cronos Labs launched a $100M Accelerator program to help developers build new projects and the future of Web3 within the Cronos ecosystem.
When developers build on Cronos, they can leverage all Ethereum developer tools (i.e. Solidity, Truffle, Hardhat, OpenZeppelin, Web3.js, ethers.js, ChainSafe Gaming SDK); leading crypto wallets (i.e. MetaMask, Crypto.com Defi Wallet, Trust Wallet); wrapped versions of the world’s top 50 cryptocurrencies; Cronos Play, a suite of developer tools for Unity, C++ and Unreal engine; and inter-blockchain communication (IBC) cross-chain connectivity to Cosmos chains; and as well as a rich ecosystem of composable DeFi and GameFi dApps.
Cronos is supported by Cronos Labs, the ecosystem grant fund, Web3 start-up accelerator, and incubator of Cronos chain.