Synthetix Founder Announces Infinex

Decentralized finance protocol Synthetix is planning an expansion of its affiliated product line.

Kain Warwick, the founder of Synthetix, announced plans to add a new derivatives front-end called Infinex to Synthetix’s decentralized trading infrastructure.

The upcoming exchange will cater to novice and seasoned traders by offering centralized exchange (CEX)-like features, such as a noncustodial central limit order book.

Even though Synthetix already operates Kwenta, a decentralized exchange (DEX) for derivatives on Optimism, Warwick identified significant issues with the current platform.

Before trading can commence, traders must bridge assets to the layer-2 rollup and exchange them for sUSD, Synthetix’s stablecoin used as margin collateral.

Adding to the inconvenience, each order or cancellation on the current platform requires the wallet signature of the trader and incurs a nominal fee.

In his blog post, Warwick emphasized the need to dispel doubts about decentralized perpetuals’ (Perps) ability to directly compete with centralized exchanges.

Being on a noncustodial decentralized exchange has advantages, and in the blog post, Warwick mocked the now-defunct FTX and other centralized exchanges for their unique counterparty risks.

Warwick emphasized the dramatic collapse of FTX in 2022.

“It’s become increasingly clear that the impediments to Synthetix Perps growth can be resolved, but this will require a new approach.”

The planned DEX will cater to traders accustomed to platforms such as Binance by providing access via a simple username and password while maintaining a noncustodial setup.

Warwick explained that Infinex would generate a unique pair of public and private keys for each user, which would be stored locally in the browser and used only for signing trade orders and not for withdrawing funds.

Warwick mentioned in a Synthetix Discord Ask Me Anything session that the technical implementation details of the DEX have been entrusted to the core developers.

The introduction of the new project is anticipated to coincide with the release of version three of Synthetix’s perpetual futures trading system in the coming months.