Niklas Kunkel: Chronicle – Ethereum's First-Ever Oracle

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Back in 2017, there was no DeFi as we know it today, yet MakerDAO were already envisioning and building towards what they thought to be a certainty. The backbone of DeFi is represented by stable coins, and MakerDAO quickly understood this: they set out to build a decentralised stable coin, $DAI (and its precursor $SAI). Being collateral-backed, the smart contract needs to know the value of that collateral, but any off-chain price data is not readily available on-chain. This is where oracles come in and provide data feeds on-chain. MakerDAO’s internal oracle has been active since 2017 on Ethereum and has recently branched out, forming Chronicle. By using aggregated Schnorr signatures, Chronicle solves the problem of oracle cost-efficient scaling.

We were joined by Niklas Kunkel, founder of Chronicle, to discuss the challenges and tradeoffs that oracles regularly face, and how Chronicle is solving them, continuing the ethos of early MakerDAO.

Topics covered in this episode:

• Niklas’ background and the early days of MakerDAO
• How MakerDAO evolved over time and the adoption of DAI
• MakerDAO’s core principles
• Why Chronicle branched out from MakerDAO
• Oracle challenges & tradeoffs
• Oracle validators
• Business model for oracles
• Providing oracle services to different blockchains
• Schnorr signatures
• Chronicle’s supported chains and oracle offerings
• Real-world assets (RWA) and credit delegation

Episode links:

• Niklas Kunkel on Twitter
• Chronicle on Twitter
• Maker DAO on Twitter

This episode is hosted by Sebastien Couture & Felix Lutsch. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/516