I spend a lot of time talking about “bridging” to L2s on my podcast, so I recently spoke to Amino and Matt from Arch to talk about why it still isn’t time to stop building for Bitcoin DeFi right on Layer 1.

Arch uses an entirely new VM inspired by Solana, but tailor-made to Bitcoin needs, including UTXOs and PSBTs. Arch can operate much like a traditional L2 that “bridges” funds for users, but can also allow programmable transactions to execute at the L1 level using Arch smart contracts, giving users a “choose your own adventure” secuirty experience.

Unlike a lot of devs today, Matt and Amino are steering away from using zero-knowledge proofs in their design, which they realized weren’t adding much benefit.

Watch to learn about Arch’s unique multisig based security which my previous guest @januszg called “the best we can do” for trustworthy Bitcoin application layers.

https://x.com/ArchNtwrk

TIMESTAMPS:-

0:33 Arch Network’s roots w/ BTC Startup Lab

4:14 What is Alchemy? The need for a Bitcoin indexer

6:10 Not giving up on Bitcoin’s base layer

7:56 How Arch Works: A New VM for Bitcoin

12:26 Arch’s transition from ZKPs to PSBTs

14:52 Arch’s proof of stake system

17:08 What is Frost? Improving multisigs

20:00 Arch network’s 26 validators

22:11 Roast: peak multi-sig architecture

25:34 Arch’s growing pains: dev education

29:20 Why didn’t Arch take the EVM route?

34:05 Building a Bitcoin L2 from scratch

37:18 Users can choose their trust assumptions

38:28 Arch’s purely organic marketing

40:08 Nearing the conclusion of Bitcoin scaling

41:30 OP_CAT would make things easier for Arch

42:30 What will be the next connective tissue for Bitcoin DeFi?

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