Maya Protocol operates as a decentralized, permissionless cross-chain swap system that relies on multiple key participants to function smoothly. Each role—whether it's swappers, liquidity providers, validator nodes, or arbitrageurs—contributes to the security, efficiency, and decentralization of the ecosystem.
There are multiple distinct (and sometimes overlapping) roles within Maya Protocol, all of which are crucial for the successful operation of Maya’s decentralized, permissionless, cross-chain swaps. Let’s take a look at the many roles that can be played within this ecosystem:
Swappers are simply the “customers” of Maya Protocol: those who are willing to pay some fees to get their exchange needs fulfilled, i.e. swapping from one coin to another. These fees that the swappers pay in turn contribute to the other roles/parties in the protocol.
Maya Protocol operates its exchange with Continuous Liquidity Pools (CLP), a form of Automated Market Maker (AMM) that enables and mechanizes its decentralized swaps. Deeper pools provide a better swapping experience, i.e. lower slippage and faster streaming swaps. Thus, it is important for Maya Protocol to attract LPs, which is why this role is incentivized.
In exchange for contributing their assets (both CACAO and exogenous chain assets) into Maya Protocol’s CLPs, LPs yield a portion of the swap fees mentioned above. This yield is dynamic, and LPs should be aware of factors like Impermanent Loss (IL) (although Maya Protocol generously does offer Impermanent Loss Protection (ILP)).
Full nodes record and store Maya Protocol’s blockchain history. Providing API endpoints for private or public use, they contribute to Maya’s transparency. As full nodes don’t take part in the chains’ consensus, chain clients aren't needed, making them relatively easy to run.
Validator Nodes run the consensus engine of Maya Protocol, putting up a bond of CACAO to do so. They must also be running one full node (i.e. a node that supports all external assets’ blockchains) so that they can observe the transactions from external blockchains—this is crucial for the Maya blockchain to execute swaps, liquidity deposits and withdrawals, etc. Lastly, VNs, via decentralized voting processes, decide the parameters or features of the Maya blockchain, rendering them Maya’s pillars of decentralization.
Because Maya Protocol is a sovereign blockchain (built using Cosmos SDK), it needs validator nodes to run the blockchain. These nodes both run the blockchain as well as manage the exogenous chain assets deposited into the CLPs.
To ensure there is no threat of validator nodes stealing any deposited assets, Maya Protocol has embedded a strong economic security model into its functional design:
They implemented a novel Liquidity Nodes (LNs) setup where nodes first need to be LPs (depositing assets into CLP); only then can they bond their LP units to be selected to be a validator node. If a node tries to perform some malicious transactions, their bonded LP units would be slashed. In this way, LNs are dually functional: not only do they validate the chain, they also provide liquidity into the CLPs—a highly capital efficient design.
In addition to the CACAO bond posted by Validator Nodes, other Liquidity Providers (LPs) can add to the node bond in exchange for a percentage of the bond’s in-kind yield.
Maya Protocol does not utilize any external oracles to align its prices with the prices in the wider crypto markets. Instead, it relies on high-frequency, profit-seeking traders to constantly price and settle Maya’s assets against external markets. These traders, called arbitrageurs, fill an all-important role for Maya; as such, their profits are regularly high yielding.
While a different type of contributor, community devs play just as valuable a role as those mentioned above. These are active community members, building useful tools for Maya—e.g., block explorers, scanners, DEXs—and contributing their expertise—e.g., Discord moderators, content creators, etc. All of their efforts are directed to ease and improve the Maya Protocol user experience.
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