Nomic: bridging bitcoin to cosmos and beyond

Nomic is a Cosmos SDK chain that helps users bring bitcoin into the Cosmos ecosystem without much hassle. The main idea behind Nomic is to provide decentralized custody for bitcoin while connecting it to multiple blockchain networks like Cosmos, Ethereum, and more. With Nomic, people can use their bitcoin across different blockchain ecosystems, without relying on centralized entities or custodians.

Besides that, Nomic announced support for Ethereum, which allows decentralized BTC to be integrated into major DeFi markets. This update introduces a new structure that lets protocols use Nomic’s decentralized bitcoin custody mechanism.

Project Background

History: Nomic was started by Turbofish, a team of developers with experience in the Cosmos ecosystem. Turbofish was founded in 2018 by Matt Bell and Judd Keppel, both of whom previously worked at Cosmos/Tendermint. They created Nomic to make sure that bitcoin interactions in the Cosmos ecosystem are secure, scalable, and fully verified.

Mission and Vision: The main goal of Nomic is to build a fully decentralized bitcoin custody engine that allows users to use bitcoin on other networks without relying on any intermediaries. In the long run, Nomic wants to connect bitcoin to multiple blockchains in a secure and efficient way, contributing to bitcoin’s adoption in the Web3 space.

Problem the Project Solves

Current Challenges: Right now, there aren’t many options for using bitcoin in decentralized apps. Bridging bitcoin to other ecosystems usually means using centralized services or custodial solutions, which come with trust and security issues. This goes against the idea of bitcoin and decentralization.

Solution: Nomic solves this by offering a decentralized custody engine for bitcoin, which lets users use bitcoin in Cosmos and other ecosystems without relying on custodians. By using their own consensus mechanism and integrating with Cosmos IBC (Inter-Blockchain Communication), Nomic brings bitcoin to multiple networks securely and in a trustless way.

Key Features

• Directly verifies the bitcoin chain, eliminating the need for oracles.
• Runs alongside bitcoin with a Proof-of-Stake mechanism to ensure security and decentralization.
• Emergency disbursal automatically returns BTC to nBTC holders if issues arise.
• Supports interoperability through Cosmos IBC, allowing bitcoin to be used across multiple chains.
• Rate-limiting through circuit breakers for withdrawals and signatory changes.

Technology Stack

• Consensus Mechanism: PoS, running alongside bitcoin.
• Blockchain Architecture: Built as a sidechain to bitcoin using the Cosmos SDK.
• Smart Contract Language: No traditional smart contract support, focusing on decentralized custody.
• Notable Technologies: Uses Orga, a custom stack for PoS blockchains, and Merk, a Merkle AVL tree built on RocksDB for high throughput and reliability. It also uses CometBFT for consensus.

Tokenomics

NOM Token: NOM is the staking token for Nomic. People can use it to secure the network and receive rewards in both NOM and nBTC.

Token Distribution:

• Total Supply at Genesis: 21,000,000 NOM
• Airdrop I: 3,500,000 NOM to ATOM holders.
• Airdrops II & III Reserve: 7,000,000 NOM for future airdrops.
• Strategic Reserve: 10,500,000 NOM held by the Nomic DAO Foundation for partnerships and validator incentives.
• Inflation Schedule: The supply will increase to 210,000,000 over nine years, with inflation reducing annually by a third.
• Staking Rewards: Rewards for validators and delegators, distributed over nine years.
• Protocol Incentives: 85,050,000 NOM reserved for future incentives.
• Community Pool: 9,450,000 NOM for governance-approved initiatives.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Strengths:

• Fully decentralized custody for bitcoin with no need for intermediaries.
• Integration with Cosmos IBC for easy interoperability across blockchains.
• Strong security measures, including full bitcoin verification and emergency fallback.

Weaknesses:

• Adoption is still limited due to the network’s new status.
• Depends on Cosmos IBC, so usability might be limited to Cosmos-compatible networks.

Team

Nomic is led by Turbofish, a company founded by Matt Bell and Judd Keppel, both of whom have previous experience working at Cosmos/Tendermint. Turbofish focuses on building secure, efficient blockchain tech using Rust, emphasizing decentralization and composability. The project also relies on community contributors for development, node operations, and governance.

Social Networks

• **Twitter**: 22k followers.
• **GitHub**: Open-source repos for the project.
• [Discord](http://Join the Nomic Discord): 5k members.
• [Telegram](http://Nomic Community): 3k participants.
• [Blog](http://Nomic Blog): Updates and announcements.

Nomic is bridging bitcoin to different blockchains in a decentralized and trustless way. With its custody solution and deep integration into the Cosmos ecosystem, Nomic gives bitcoin holders more ways to use their BTC across DeFi and other blockchain use cases.

For more information, check out the official project documentation.

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