Centralized exchanges might soon be a thing of the past if decentralized exchange technologies like Atomic Swaps are accepted by the blockchain contributors like TWINS by New Capital. Atomic swaps technology aims to allow users to make peer-to-peer transactions without the need of centralized exchanges. The need to eliminate centralized exchanges is important because of their vulnerability to seizures, hacks and unexpected shutdowns. Not forgetting the cost of services rendered by centralized exchanges. Now to understand Atomic Swaps the first question is…

What is Atomic Swaps?

Simply put, Atomic Swaps, which is also known as the Atomic cross-chain trading, is the direct trade of one cryptocurrency for another cryptocurrency without the need of a third party.

How do Atomic Swaps work?

Atomic Swaps utilize Hash Time-locked Contracts (HTLCs) to facilitate trade. Hashed Time-lock Contract is a smart contract that acts like a puzzle. It has a secret key that has to be provided, by a solver, before a certain time has elapsed. If the key is not provided then the reward goes back to the initiator of the contract.

Therefore HTLCs require the recipient of a payment to generate a cryptographic proof of payment as a way of acknowledging receiving the payment before a set deadline. Therefore, if the recipient fails to acknowledge in time, the funds go back to the sender. The whole process is done automatically.

For example, there is Mike who owns 10 Bitcoins and wants to trade for 200 Litecoins. And there is Rose who has 200 Litecoins and wants to trade for 10 Bitcoins. Mike will have to submit his transaction on the Bitcoin blockchain. And Rose will submit her transaction on the Litecoin blockchain. Now if Mike wants to take the 200 Litecoins Rose sent, he will have to provide proof of payment, which is a number only known to him. The number acts as a key, which was used to generate a cryptographic hash. Rose will also have to provide the same key, so as to claim the 10 Bitcoins provided by Mike.

Atomic Swaps Requirement

Now for cryptocurrency to successfully support Atomic Swaps, there are some fundamental requirements needed, which include the Lightning network. The lightning network allows payment channels to link together. Using the above example of Mike and Rose, for their transaction to take place they had to be linked through payment channels. And the Lightning network allows for such linkage.

Also, a transaction between two different Blockchains will require both Blockchains to share a similar cryptographic hash function, like SHA-256. Both cryptos being traded will have to be compatible with time lock contracts. And certain computer programming knowledge is required for now, when using Atomic Swaps.

Note that the Atomic Swaps requirements are also the limitations of using Atomic Swaps. The requirements limit;

1. The number of cryptos to benefit from the swaps
2. The number of individuals and companies who can experiment on the swaps

But not to worry because these limitations are known in the crypto ecosystem, and sure enough, they are already solutions being worked on. For example, already there is the off-chain Atomic Swaps powered by Lightning network, which hopefully might solve the limitations mentioned above.

Why use Atomic Swaps?

Well, because Atomic Swaps are the best alternative to traditionally centralized exchanges. They are;

1. Secure

Atomic Swaps eliminate the reliance of third-party exchanges, which are vulnerable to failures and are costly too. Such failures include hacking, for example, the EtherDelta hack which was a costly loss. There is also the sudden disappearance of exchanges with people’s funds, which might be due to hacking or technical issues or just deliberate. Either way, as long as users have no control over their funds, then it becomes a risky and costly venture. And Atomic Swaps aim to give total control of user funds back to the users.

2. Cost-effective

And because Atomic Swaps eliminate third-party exchange reliance when it comes to transactions, the cost is reduced. Without third-party exchanges reliance, there are no fees to be accrued for services rendered. And users are able to save on cash that would have been spent on paying for centralized exchanges services.

3. Require no Regulations

Also, Atomic Swaps decentralized nature eliminates the need for regulations that always accompany centralized exchanges. Because no one person or authority is in control of the transactions, there are no regulations. That is the essence of cryptocurrency, decentralization, which leads to immutability, therefore no government interference through regulations.

4. Fast

And finally, Atomic swaps introduce an efficient and fast way of trading through wallet-to-wallet. Users get to transact directly with each other without relying on third parties. Therefore a buyer is able to send tokens directly to a seller and get the exchanged tokens in time.

Where are we currently?

Atomic Swaps is already enjoying massive success. Especially considering that the creator of Litecoin, Charlie Lee, has successfully completed Atomic Swaps using Litecoin in exchange for Bitcoin. But the success of Atomic Swaps is constrained in that, for the Atomic Swaps to happen between two cryptocoins a user will be required to download the blockchains of either crypto coin.

The desire of the Atomic Swaps technology to conveniently allow average users to run decentralized exchanges is already becoming a reality. What this means is that a user can now interact with crypto coins without the need to download a whole Blockchain. And it’s all thanks to TWINS protocol which makes the whole process possible.

The Future of Atomic Swaps

The future of Atomic Swaps looks bright. Considering the huge steps the TWINS team is taking to ensure that decentralized exchanges are accessible and easy to use even for the average user. The New Capital’s innovative ecosystem that pledges to offer an amazing and secure peer to peer fund transfer capabilities which will not cost anything.

The race of who has the best services is bound to lead to interesting user experience and user interface in the near future, which will enable easy use of decentralized exchange.

There is also bound to be decentralized exchanges that utilize the use of off-chain atomic swaps and on chain atomic swaps. Such decentralized exchanges will increase the usability of the platforms.

TWINS Website — https://win.win/