Arbitrum Onboards Norway’s Digital Krone

Arbitrum, the leading Layer 2 scaling solution for Ethereum, is making major strides towards expanding its ecosystem, with the network onboarding Norway’s digital currency and adding native support for Circle’s USDC stablecoin.

On Tuesday, Symfoni Solutions, a team facilitating digital interactions between government services, announced the launch of a bridge between Norway’s central bank digital currency (CBDC) and BRØK, an Arbitrum-based platform for tracking and managing shareholder data for unlisted companies.

“Picture a universe where your local bank and the decentralized finance world cross paths, allowing you to buy and sell stocks using a digital currency tied to the Norwegian Krone. This isn’t make-believe — it’s a reality we’re actively shaping with the Norwegian government,” Symfoni said.

The Arbitrum-based NOK token is programmable, enabling “anonymous transactions with stealth addresses, Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance, predefined maximum limits, and continuous compounding interest.” Arbitrum first revealed that Norway was using its technology for BRØK in June 2022.

Arbitrum is fighting to preserve its position as Ethereum’s top Layer 2 (L2) network as it faces increasing competition from old and new rivals. Its ARB token is up 2% over the past month.

Optimism, the second-ranked L2 with a 19% market share, launched its Bedrock upgrade on June 6, updating its technology to a modular open-source stack. zkSync Era, a zero-knowledge rollup from Matter Labs, has rocketed into third place with $430M in total value locked (TVL) since launching 10 weeks ago.

Arbitrum is the top L2 with $5.6B in TVL, or 65% market share, according to L2Beat. Arbitrum processed more than 1.1M transactions over the past 24 hours, surpassing Ethereum mainnet by 5%, according to Orbiter Finance.

Native USDC Support

On Thursday, Circle launched native support for USDC, the second-largest stablecoin, on Arbitrum.

The integration allows institutions to deposit and withdraw from Arbitrum via Circle, and also introduces token redemption services for Arbitrum USDC. The company plans to add support for its Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol to eliminate withdrawal delays when moving assets from Arbitrum.

The network previously supported bridged USDC, posing potential security risks.

On Wednesday, LayerZero, a growing cross-chain messaging protocol, also launched on Arbitrum Nova, a web3 gaming-focused offering from Offchain Labs.

LayerZero is already a popular protocol on Arbitrum One, the flagship Arbitrum solution. The protocol has processed more than $5B worth of cross-chain volume since integrating support for the L2 in November.

Governance Reboot

The Arbitrum is also weighing two governance proposals from Offchain Labs, following community backlash in response to Arbitrum’s first attempt at decentralized governance in April.

Offchain Labs, the team behind Arbitrum, put forward a governance proposal seeking to ratify the establishment of a Cayman Islands-based foundation, alongside a $1B ARB grant to cover past expenses and future operations.

However, one of the project’s governance delegates revealed that the 750M ARB in question was already allocated to the foundation, suggesting the vote was a mere formality. The foundation also sold off $10M worth of ARB immediately after the token was airdropped.

AIP-1.1 proposes locking the remaining 700M ARB in a smart contract for linear release over four years, after which the foundation can use the tokens at its discretion. The proposal also outlines a $36M budget for the foundation over 12 months, spanning “personnel, contractors, legal, insurance, and other operational costs.”

The foundation currently comprises five full-time contributors, eight contractors, and its Security Council. The budget includes funds to pay 15 new full-time contributors.

AIP-1.2 amends the Arbitrum Constitution, which was rejected by the community in April. The amendments include removing all references to the failed proposal, reducing the ARB needed to launch an on-chain vote from 5M to 1M, and clarifying that the foundation received 7.5% of ARB’s supply upon token genesis.

The community will vote on the proposals from June 10 until June 24.