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Crypto traders who like a little variety in their lives now have a new and potentially simpler way to trade assets across Ethereum-compatible networks.
Ethereum DeFi exchange Matcha released cross chain swaps today, which allows users to trade tokens from one ETH-compatible chain, such as Polygon, to another, like Avalanche.
This will matter for the token-flipping degens and investors who are experienced in DeFi, since such trades are generally messy business for the 3.7 million digital wallets juggling multiple chains.
Users typically handle moving assets from chain to chain with bridges, but most bridges don’t have the greatest user experience—and it’s hard to know which bridges are legitimate—plus long wait times and hefty fees. It’s a pain.
Matcha hopes to alleviate some of this pain with built-in cross chain swaps on their exchange, which now support seven networks: Ethereum, Optimism, Polygon, Arbitrum, Avalanche, Base, BNB Chain, and Fantom.
Abstracting bridges
As a decentralized exchange (DEX) aggregator on Ethereum, Matcha aggregates liquidity from various other exchanges, which enables users to find the best prices for their trades across different liquidity sources. Other such aggregators include 1inch, KyberSwap, and OpenOcean.
According to Matcha co-founder Will Warren, Matcha’s goal is to create a frictionless experience for accessing and trading tokens in a crypto landscape where the number of tokens is exploding.
The way it accomplishes this is similar to how Matcha currently handles swaps across different DEXs. Matcha looks for the most efficient route for your swap and executes it—with their cross chain swaps, it adds bridges to the list of potential routes your tokens can take. This allows users to move assets from chain to chain, and know they have the cheapest or most efficient route available.
The cross chain swap landscape
At the moment, your options for moving assets across different chains are: aggregators (like Matcha), in-wallet transfers through Metamask, traditional bridges, and centralized exchanges (like Coinbase or Binance).
Ethereum wallet Metamask supports cross chain swaps—and it’s probably the most convenient option out there. However you pay a fee for the convenience in the form of a hefty fee taken by Metamask.
Centralized exchanges (CEX) like Coinbase are also a popular option. Users can send crypto assets to a CEX and withdraw different assets to a wallet address on whatever chain they please. This also accrues some fees (varying based on which CEX is used), and requires the user to KYC (i.e. provide personally identifiable information), which isn’t the case on a DEX like Matcha.
With traditional bridges, they work but are a bit clunky. You often need to wrap tokens in order to bridge, and figure out what token is needed for gas on your destination chain. There’s also the concern of knowing whether you’re using a legitimate bridge and you’re not about to send your tokens into the void. Matcha’s swaps will use only “battle-tested official bridges,” according to the company.
Sushiswap offers a cross-chain swap feature similar to Matcha. Sushi launched its feature in August 2022, and since then it’s generated $72.9 million in volume.
Cross chain swaps, according to Warren, go beyond being technical bridges; they're a comprehensive product layer that simplifies the process for users—no more juggling different websites, swap platforms, or opening multiple browser tabs.
Matcha also doesn’t apply a fee for its new service, so traders can make use of cross chain swaps on the platform without incurring extra costs.