On Thursday, Shiba Inu marketing lead Lucie (@LucieSHIB) announced the official launch date for liquid staking on the Shibarium network. The announcement was made via a video posted to X on August 15, marking a pivotal moment for the project.

Lucie celebrated the development team’s progress and said: “Let’s give a big shout out to the incredible K9 Finance team! Liquid staking is on its way to SHIBARIUM! The KNINE testnet is live for everyone! Mark your calendars: Liquid Staking launches on Shibarium on September 18th!”

Let’s give a big round of applause to the incredible @K9finance team! 🚀

Liquid staking is on its way to SHIBARIUM!

The $KIN testnet is live for everyone!

🗓️ Mark your calendars: Liquid Staking launches on @ShibariumNet this September 18th! photo.twitter.com/nJuSEhxaRO

— 𝐋𝐔𝐂𝐈𝐄 (@LucieSHIB) August 15, 2024

What the Shiba Inu Community Can Expect

Shibarium, a layer-2 blockchain solution built to improve scalability and reduce transaction fees for Shiba Inu and its tokens, is now entering a pivotal phase with the integration of liquid staking. This feature will be facilitated via K9 Finance, the designated Liquid Staking Derivatives (LSD) platform for the ecosystem.

Users can stake their BONE tokens through K9 Finance and receive knBONE, a liquid staking derivative token. This token acts as a tradable receipt representing the user’s stake, which can be freely traded or used as collateral in various DeFi applications. This model maintains asset liquidity, allowing users to conduct other financial activities without tying up their funds, increasing flexibility and the potential for additional income through DeFi platforms.

The first phase of testing for the BONE Crusher feature began in the last week of July and targeted large-scale token holders, colloquially referred to as “whales,” who held at least 400 million KNINE DAO tokens. This phase allowed these large stakeholders to actively participate in the staking process, allowing them to stake BONE, earn knBONE, and participate in earning additional rewards, including partner tokens and retroactive KNINE rewards.

After the success of this phase, K9 Finance is now opening the testnet to the wider public. This removes previous restrictions and allows a larger user base to get started with the test functions.

With the mainnet launch on September 18th, the project will enter its second of three phases. The second phase, ‘Boro’, was scheduled for a mainnet launch in Q3 20204, so it will arrive right on time. Boro takes its name from the extinct Borophaginae, a nod to the “BONE crushing dogs” that inspired this phase. It represents the full operational deployment of K9 Finance’s flagship liquid staking product on the Shibarium network.

The final phase, ‘Caninae’, scheduled for Q4 2024, will see the launch of a V2. This phase will “include all living canine species, including the Shiba Inu! It is the modern Canine and symbolic of building K9 to become the modern expectation of a fully decentralized liquid staking derivative product. It is the completion of K9,” according to the announcement in March of this year.

Notably, K9 Finance DAO launched its own governance token KNINE on March 7. This ERC20 token was initially available exclusively on Uniswap.

At the time of going to press, SHIB was trading at $0.00001370.

Main image created with DALL.E, chart from TradingView.com