Argent Takes Key Step Towards 'Invisible Wallet' With Newest Web Wallet Launch

With Argent's new web wallet, users only have to supply dapps with an email address and a password to get started.

Instead of connecting with the Starknet-based NFT building platform Briq, for example, users can now click the "create" button to test out the web wallet.

Once an email is supplied, users are sent a confirmation code to the linked address. If they forget their password, the process for resetting is also the same as various web2 apps–users are sent a code and can reset their password.

"The way it works is that your privacy is encrypted with your password," Argent's CEO Itamar Lesuisse told Decrypt. "It's fully encrypted, we have no access, and we save a copy of the encrypted version."

The tool comes with a dashboard, too, where users can add funds, review their assets, and check which apps the tool is linked to.

"This is really a step toward the invisible wallet," he said, referring to a recent talk from Julien Niset, another Argent co-founder, at EthCC Paris this year.

It may seem simple, but in an industry plagued by user experience issues, the move aims to remove a ton of friction (and hopefully onboard a ton more users).

"If you were on a traditional wallet, you would have to do four different transactions," said Lesuisse. "You would approve the token, you would buy the BRIQ [Briq's native token], approve the transaction, and then you would assemble the Briq. Here, with this entire thing, I confirm. And that's it."

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It’s no secret that crypto wallets need a makeover, and fast. But as the pieces and players leading this makeover emerge, so too is a fight over what to call the effort. Some call it account abstraction, others call it EIP-4337. “We call it a smart wallet," Argent cofounder and CEO Itamar Lesuisse told Decrypt. "It’s as simple as that.” Argent, along with Safe (formerly Gnosis Safe), is at the forefront of the account abstraction movement, making crypto wallets easier, and smarter, to use. Walle...

The use of Briq as an example is a nod to the broader Starknet ecosystem, the speedy layer-2 solution with which Argent has deep integrations. Starknet is an Ethereum scaling solution, which allows for faster and cheaper transactions.

That's in part due to the wallet provider's ambitions to become the smartest crypto wallet of the bunch, adding a suite of flexible features that developers refer to as account abstraction. This would include things like recurring payments, account recovery, and pretty much all the minor features that make your online banking experience better than using the average crypto wallet.

"On Starknet, you can only do smart contract wallets. And we have a massive edge here, with 75% of the market share. It would be really hard for MetaMask to come there tomorrow," LeSuisse said.