What is renBTC?

RenBTC (RENBTC) is an ERC-20-backed 1:1 coin by Bitcoin. Users can obtain renBTC by sending BTC to a RenVM address on the Bitcoin blockchain. This locks the user's BTC in the address, mints renBTC, and sends it to a designated wallet on the Ethereum blockchain.

RENBTC can be used on Ethereum and other blockchains’ decentralised apps (dapps) while being tied to Bitcoin’s value.

A brief history of renBTC

Ren, formerly known as Republic Protocol, is the development firm behind the Ren ecosystem and was founded by Taiyang Zhang, who is its current CEO, and Loong Wang, who was also the company’s CTO before leaving in October 2021. RenBTC went live in mid-May 2020.

Before Ren, Zhang was a founding member of KeeperDAO and one of the co-founders of cryptocurrency trading firm Virgil Capital. Wang was the lead software developer for Neucode, and he also holds an academic position at the Australian National University.

Shortly after its debut, there was a dispute over how all RENBTC was housed in a single wallet, meaning a single corporation owned US$200 million in user money as of late August 2020. Wang noted that it was a precautionary measure for a large project at an early stage.

How renBTC works

Users can obtain RENBTC by sending BTC to a RenVM address on the Bitcoin blockchain. This locks the user's BTC in the address, mints RENBTC, and sends it to a designated wallet on the Ethereum blockchain.

RenVM stores the deposited BTC in a network of decentralised nodes called ‘darknodes’, which require a minimum stake of 100,000 REN tokens to run.

To redeem BTC, users need to burn RENBTC on Ethereum. The locked BTC is released to a designated Bitcoin address when the RENBTC burn is confirmed.

What is RENBTC used for?

The token is a direct rival to Wrapped Bitcoin (wBTC). It is a fully asset-backed token, as for every RENBTC, one BTC must be deposited.

Ren enables users to deposit BTC to generate RENBTC, an ERC-20 token they can then use in Ethereum's ecosystem (e.g., to interact with other ERC-20 tokens, dapps and smart contracts, or DeFi protocols). Bitcoin itself has no smart contract capabilities, so Ren works as a bridge to equip BTC with Ethereum capabilities while maintaining a peg to Bitcoin.