About

Mantle Liquid Staking Protocol (LSP) is an ETH liquid staking protocol deployed on Ethereum and governed by Mantle. Native ETH can be staked to receive ERC-20 mETH, a non-rebasing liquid staking derivative (LSD) token. The exchange rate between mETH and native ETH gradually increases as ETH staking rewards accumulate “from issuance, priority fees, and MEV…shared among the stakers, LSP, and node operator (validation service provider).” Mantle’s LSP offers double the market rate yield via its “Double-Dose Drive” program, up to a cap of 600,000 staked ETH. This additional yield comes from ETH rewards earned by ETH staked from the Mantle Treasury.

History

Originally proposed as a BitDAO-sponsored Layer-2 project in June 2022, Mantle Network’s Testnet went live in January 2023. The protocol was founded by Jordi Alexander and Arjun Krishan Kalsy, who sought to create a modular solution that would scale Ethereum smart contract capabilities. In May 2023, BitDAO’s BIP-21 was passed, resulting in BitDAO rebranding to Mantle, and the token migration of ERC-20 BIT to ERC-20 MNT. Following this, Mantle Network unveiled its mainnet alpha in July 2023. Of note, as of March 27, 2024, approximately 9.86 billion ERC-20 BIT (~98.64% of the maximum supply) has been sent to the nominated burn address.

Mantle Network has deployed additional protocol features since its mainnet launch. The Mantle Network Bridge was launched on July 15, 2023. The following month, Mantle Journey was launched on Aug. 29, 2023. The network’s Multi-sig feature was launched on Sept. 8, 2023, with MigratorV2 launching on Sept. 18, 2023, in line with plans detailed in MIP-27. In November 2023, Mantle Liquid Staking Protocol’s (LSP) Alpha launched, allowing users to stake native ETH for mETH on Ethereum. On March 15, 2024, Mantle Network’s Tectonic (V2) upgrade was completed, components of which included introducing EIP-1559 support, removing Threshold Signature Scheme (TSS) nodes, and a fixed-block schedule with a block generated every two seconds. Additionally, following the Mantle V2 Tectonic upgrade, MNT became the native token of Mantle, whereas the token was previously “a bridged version of its Ethereum ERC-20 counterpart.”

The Mantle Network sequencer, responsible for collecting and ordering users’ transactions, is centralized and operated by the core team. On Feb. 21, 2024, the project team published a blog post detailing an intended fair sequencer architecture accomplished via verifiable randomness functions. A commercially reasonable search found no disclosures from the Mantle team regarding an intended launch date for such a sequencer.

Additionally, Mantle Network is in the process of developing an interactive fraud-proof system. The fraud-proof model that Mantle Network plans to employ is similar to the one deployed by Specular Network. This system involves multiple parties: a challenger, who claims a fraudulent assertion, and a defender, who supports the said assertion. The system is designed to narrow down the assertion to a single state transition, which is then verified for its validity. Based on a commercially reasonable search, no verifiable release date for this mechanism could be found.

The protocol intends to use Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)-level instructions for compiling and verifying fraud proofs. This choice aims to allow all Ethereum clients to interact with a common proof system without requiring permission. It is also designed to reduce trust assumptions among network actors, including verifiers, clients, and compilers.

A full list of potential upgrades to Mantle Network can be seen on the Mantle Network roadmap under “Potential Implement.”