Acala is a decentralized blockchain within the Polkadot ecosystem. Acala is known as the longest running liquid staking token (LST) protocol for its liquid staking token, LDOT. It's powered by a multi-collateral-backing mechanism, ensuring stability and trustless integration for various assets. With its recent Exodus upgrade, Acala aims to grow its ecosystem, build the “liquidity layer of Web3 finance”, and elevate ACA utility.
There are many different things you can do with Acala. View the different functions here. Hover over the left side of your screen and choose whichever appeals to you!
The “Home” tab gives you an overview of the different features you can access with Acala. These features include bridging assets, Polkadot staking, and staking liquidity pool (LP) tokens. Explore each to see which one you’re interested in!
You can view your current assets in the “Portfolio” section. You can see your total balance, view specific asset balances, check your current staking positions, and view your NFTs. You can also send, receive, and bridge each specific asset from here.
The “Staking” feature allows you to lock up your ACA to secure the network, and then get tokens as a reward. Stake, unstake, and claim your rewards here. You can view the APY, loyalty bonus, rewards emission rate, and your current balance here. You can also provide liquidity to a liquidity pool through LP staking and get rewards as well.
Use the “Bridge” tab to transfer your assets to different blockchains. Select the source chain and destination chain, choose the asset and amount of it to send, review your transaction details, and then transfer. You can also bind your Ethereum address to your Polkadot address here to use Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) features easily.
The “Swap” feature allows you to swap your existing tokens for other tokens. Select the token you wish to swap and the token you wish to swap for, review the transaction details, and finalize your transaction to receive your tokens. You can also provide liquidity to a liquidity pool and get LP tokens as rewards. Clicking “Bootstrap” shows the pools that are under the Bootstrap program, which lets users deposit in it before actual trading begins to stabilize prices.
“Liquid Staking” lets you convert your DOT tokens into LDOT to earn staking rewards while maintaining liquidity. You will get staking rewards from the locked DOT while you can use the equivalent LDOT on other applications. Here, you can view the APY, total staked DOT, view your current staking positions, and read up on the different validators.
This section allows you to learn more about the upcoming aUSD conversion this July 20, 2024 with Acala 2.0. You can also view aggregated oracle price data of assets in this page.
Acala allows users to participate in the “Governance” of the network by voting. You can view ongoing and past governance proposals affecting Acala's development. If you hold ACA, you can also vote on proposals. You can also view the different councils governing specific categories in the network as well as their vote weight.
“Euphrates” is a liquidity dApp designed to amplify staking rewards. It currently operates on the Karura testnet, but eventually plans to be a core component of Acala. You can deposit your DOT there to provide liquidity and earn LST tokens of your choice which you can use in other dApps.
