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Budapest, Hungary, March 6th, 2025, Chainwire

Today, decentralized lending protocol Malda (previously Mendi Finance) announces the launch of its incentivized testnet. The testnet will be cohosted with RISC Zero. Malda is set to redefine DeFi lending with its first-of-its-kind Unified Liquidity Lending model, allowing users to seamlessly supply, borrow, withdraw, and repay assets across multiple chains while leveraging zkProofs for enhanced security. The testnet will help bolster platform stability and security to ensure they provide their users with the most robust and safeguarded experience ahead of mainnet.

Currently, the proliferation of L2s has caused significant market fragmentation in DeFi. This has led to market inefficiency, price slippage, inadequate UX, and greater market volatility, among other impacts. Unlike in centralized finance where centralized clearinghouses provide market liquidity allowing brokers and exchanges to more easily trade, DeFi lacks a unified liquidity layer to support seamless capital movement.

Malda’s first-of-its-kind unified liquidity layer provides DeFi with a decentralized clearinghouse, unlocking a massive increase in capital efficiency. 

Initially launching with support for Ethereum Sepolia, Linea Sepolia, and Optimism Sepolia, the testnet will run for 10 days and is designed to engage and reward users for exploring the Malda ecosystem. Malda also has plans to facilitate Ethereum and other Major L2s once on mainnet. The campaign will commence with exclusive access for whitelisted users, those who signed up for the waitlist, on the first day. 

After the initial 24 hours, the testnet opens to the public, allowing broader participation. All campaign tasks will be shared and verified via Galxe, with participants earning XP through two types of challenges: Revealed Tasks and Hidden Challenges.

• Revealed Tasks: on-chain interactions with clear instructions, such as supplying or borrowing a set amount of assets from specific chains. 
• Hidden Challenges: focus on social engagement and qualitative feedback, with only hints provided to users. The exact criteria for earning XP in these challenges remain undisclosed, and a limited number of standout participants for rewards at the end of the campaign.

The rewards for participating in the testnet will come in the form of Malda Awakening NFTs. The NFTs will be awarded on a tier-based system. Once Malda’s mainnet launches, boosted points will be provided to Malda NFT holders.

Barna Kiss, Co-Founder & CEO of Malda says “We are excited to be partnering with RISC Zero to launch our first ever incentivized testnet. Over the past year, our team has been working diligently to ensure our platform is solid and secure, allowing external participants to test and explore the platform directly is an exciting next step in our journey.“

Jacob Everly, Product Lead of RISC Zero says “We appreciate the opportunity to work with Malda on their first major step towards mainnet. At RISC Zero, we are making zero-knowledge proof technology accessible, performant, and low-cost for all developers. We envision a future where ZK is used on every chain to enhance scalability, interoperability, and privacy for every application.”

The testnet coincides with Malda’s rebrand from its previous title Mendi Finance. With a newfound identity, over the next year, Malda plans on expanding into the next-gen lending protocol that will use the power of zero-knowledge proofs to provide unparalleled services via off-chain computations while remaining fully verifiable. 

For more information on how to participate and further details on the testnet, users can visit malda.xyz. 

About Malda (Previously Mendi Finance)

Malda is a Unified Liquidity Lending protocol on Ethereum and Layer 2s, delivering a seamless lending experience through global liquidity pools, all secured by zkProofs.* 

Malda is the first DeFi protocol built fully on a zkCoprocessor technology to create unified pools within the wider Ethereum ecosystem that act in sync to provide uninterrupted money market services solving the problem of liquidity fragmentation.

For more information, users can visit Malda's website or follow Malda on X.

About RiscZero

RISC Zero pioneered the first RISC-V general-purpose zKVM, enabling any developers to write zero-knowledge proofs using Rust. 

Now, RISC Zero is building Boundless, the first universal protocol bringing ZK to every chain. Boundless empowers any chain to unlock unlimited execution through a marketplace for verifiable compute. Learn more at www.risczero.com.

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