What's Next for Trader Joe?
The Product roadmap reveal for the Trader Joe DEX
A Short Joe-cap
Trader Joe launched back in July 2021 and gained traction by prioritizing community and user experience. The DEX continued to evolve post launch, expanding to new chains, introducing a novel take on concentrated liquidity ‘Liquidity Book’ (DLMM) and generating a lifetime spot trading volume of over $110bn.
The DLMM has since gone on to be adopted by a number of popular exchanges. While the protocol is acclaimed for its high-performance liquidity provision compared to existing CLMMs, there are some shortcomings when considering the broader picture of where onchain exchanges can evolve in the coming years.
This sets the stage for the renewed vision of the Trader Joe DEX.
Joe’s Original Thesis
The ambition of Trader Joe has always been to build an all-encompassing DeFi platform, a true ‘one-stop shop.’ The original thesis highlighted key primitives, such as Limit Order Books, which were initially limited by blockchain capabilities. Since that thesis was shared in 2021, DeFi has made significant strides. Today, there are hundreds of chains, thousands more dApps, and a suite of narratives—all collectively building towards an onchain future. This original thesis also gave a glimpse into the founding motivations of Trader Joe:
To serve all users at the frontiers of DeFi - @cryptofishx co-founder
Put simply, Trader Joe was founded with the ambition to serve users by building novel products that offer a kick-ass experience and like a freshly paved yellow brick road, this core vision remains steadfast. Trader Joe recognizes and understands the needs of traders and DeFi users alike, and remains committed to delivering on that vision.
What’s Next: Joe’s Road Ahead
So, the big question now is…What's next for Joe?
The onchain world is in a bit of a paradoxical position—it is forever growing larger, proliferating with new ecosystems, but it will also get smaller. As performant blockchains rise to the top and interoperability continues to improve, the expectation is we’ll see a concentration of competition in the next-generation, general-purpose blockchains. Naturally, users of all sorts will flock to the very best ecosystems in terms of depth, diversity, liquidity and user-centric benefits, such as speed and cost efficiency. These are the battlegrounds where Joe aims to thrive.
Therefore, the goal for Joe in the coming months is to take the next steps towards the big opportunities that lay on the horizon. The DEX will undergo significant evolution in the next months, with the aim of becoming the ultimate one-stop-shop decentralized exchange—an onchain marketplace for the masses to rival CEXs, the perfect DEX for every DeFi degen. Traders with Joe will always win.
The goal is simple: Serve real users with the best trading experience onchain
The Joe Stack
Traders with Joe will always win
To build the ultimate decentralize exchange, the existing DEX will be expanded to feature new products that form the ‘Joe Stack’. This product stack will position the platform as an all encompassing one-stop-shop that will serve all traders, rivaling a CEX like experience.
The Joe Stack will be comprised of the following protocols:
Joe Classic (Classic AMM / Joe v1)
Liquidity Book (DLMM / Joe v2)
Token Mill (Bonding Curve AMM / Joe v3)
Bid Barn (CLOB / Joe v4)
Aggregator Service
Bid Barn (CLOB - Joe v4)
Next Level Capital Efficiency
Central Limit Order Books (CLOB) will be the next battleground for decentralized exchanges. While Liquidity Book (LB) and other Concentrated Liquidity Market Makers (CLMMs) are both capital efficient and composable, order books can offer significantly higher capital efficiency, resulting in larger swaps at greater cost efficiency for Traders.
For an onchain DEX to truly rival its centralized counterparts, an onchain limit order book will be essential. This evolution of the Joe exchange places the CLOB as a core protocol, central to the long-term ambitions of Trader Joe. To onboard the next billion users into DeFi, DEXs need to offer a superior experience for traders—emphasizing speed, security, and cost-effectiveness. Trader Joe is committed to building the future of exchanges and Bid Barn will be central to that success.
Bid Barn is currently being built, launch plans will be shared in the coming months.
Token Mill (BCAMM - Joe v3)
A True Bonding Curve AMM
Announced in early 2024, Token Mill is a Bonding Curve Automated Market Maker (BCAMM) that supports token creation, locking and trading.
Token Mill redefines the possibilities of token creation, offering creators full flexibility in designing bonding curves. There are no limits to this process. Token Mill will therefore unlock a new dimension of possibility for onchain token creation.
In addition to these creation possibilities, Token Mill features a native token locker that allows creators to lock and vest tokens over time. This ensures that teams have the option to align with the long-term success of their projects. This key feature fosters a safer environment v the current bonding curve trading venues we see today, facilitating a more balanced market that enables a safer level of speculation.
Additionally, Token Mill has been built with DeFi in mind. Tokens launched on Token Mill, be it ERC20 or 404s, are instantly composable with DeFi. This ensures full integration possibilities with existing primitives and removes the negative effect of isolating closed-circuit of creation and speculation.
There will be no fees when creating and launching tokens on Token Mill, creators will be able to earn a share of fees from all buy transactions.
Token Mill is currently in audit and the platform is being built and tested, you can expect to learn more about Token Mill in the upcoming release of the litepaper.
The One Stop Shop
Unifying liquidity and experience
With the planned suite of trading protocols on the DEX, an aggregator will be launched to bind them together which will include native multi-pool hopping when executes swaps. This service will also aggregate liquidity from other DEXs, ensuring that traders use the Trader Joe platform, will always win. The Aggregator will be launched soon on Avalanche and can also be integrated by other DEX platforms.
Trader Joe is committed to building a one-stop-shop experience, expanding the current offering to include quality-of-life features that enhance the ability for users to not only swap but also manage and monitor all of their DeFi affairs.
The aggregator will roll out shortly with new feature enhancements over the coming months to align with the broader product roadmap.
Loyalty For Joe
Times are changing
Back in ‘21 everyone loved a classic yield farm. Today, there is lots of noise and competition for attention. Onchain activities are wide ranging and gamification is hot, people want rewards, both onchain and offchain. At the peak of it all are loyal users, who typically go unrecognised for their advocacy and contributions. Joe intends to change this.
Loyalty For Joe sets to offer a new type of experience that will be introduced to the userbase of the DEX. It’s not a questing platform, instead, it will be a natural extension to your existing interactions. The aim is to provide an experience that rewards loyal users for simply being loyal users, LFJ.
To Summarise
The next few months will mark a pivotal moment in the lifecycle of the Trader Joe DEX, the product roadmap is but one piece of a larger strategic shift. Further announcements can be expected in September and October and new features, enhancements and protocol details will also be shared through the Autumn months.
Our goal is simple:
Traders with Joe will always win.
About Trader Joe
Trader Joe is a leading multi-chain decentralized exchange and the inventor of Liquidity Book, the most capital efficient AMM in DeFi. Trade your favorite tokens, access one-click yield farming and shop for the latest digital collectibles at the Joepegs NFT Marketplace. DeFi has never been easier thanks to Trader Joe.