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In brief

The amount of Bitcoin converted into Ethereum-based ERC-20 tokens had hit $1.2 billion, per data from Dune Analytics. This means that 0.5% of all of Bitcoins market cap has been ported to the Ethereum blockchain, also equivalent to 3% of Ethereums market cap.

This is the most Bitcoin that's moved over to the Ethereum blockchain to date. Just weeks ago, the figure was less than half what it is today, sitting at just over $500 million.

The Bitcoin blockchain is incompatible with the Ethereum blockchain, but its possible to stake Bitcoin in certain protocols and receive synthetic, Ethereum-based Bitcoin. These are ERC-20 tokensthe generic token standard on Ethereumthat represent Bitcoin.

Popular options include wBTC, renBTC and the newly launched tBTC. Some, such as wBTC, are custodial, meaning that you give your Bitcoin to a company and theyll give you wBTC, also known as Wrapped Bitcoin, in return. Others, such as tBTC, are non-custodial, meaning that you give your Bitcoin to a protocol and the codenot a companyissues you with tBTC.

People might port Bitcoin over to Ethereum to enjoy the full spectrum of decentralized finance (DeFi) products, such as non-custodial lending protocols, decentralized exchanges and (yet more) synthetic assets. These sorts of crypto-lending and yield-generating services are otherwise largely unavailable to Bitcoin holders.

DeFi is this summers great, big, new thing, partly responsible for this summers Ethereum bull run. As of this writing, $10.5 billion is locked up in DeFi smart contracts, per metrics site DeFi Pulse. Its rise is, again in part, due to the new token distribution mechanisms, such as giving out so-called governance tokenstokens that let holders vote on proposals to update the networkfor using the protocols.

Some, such as Set Protocol, issue these yield farming rewardsthe practice is known as yield farmingfor wBTC, i.e. synthetic Bitcoin.

wBTC is the most popular synthetic Bitcoin on Ethereum; it has 73.6% of the markets supply. renBTC has 18.4%, and Huobi BTC, or hBTC, has 4.2%.

The views and opinions expressed by the author are for informational purposes only and do not constitute financial, investment, or other advice.

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A Record $1.2 Billion in Bitcoin Has Now Moved to Ethereum - Decrypt