For friends who are interested in the BTC ecosystem, do you ever wonder like I do: Besides holding and transferring Bitcoin, when will it be easy to play DeFi like ETH? No need to sell BTC, no need to hassle with cross-chain swaps, and still enjoy secure and reliable ecosystem benefits?

Yesterday, a friend introduced me to a “big brother” in the BTC ecosystem—@rootstock_io (Chinese account @RootstockCN), and its upcoming $500,000 benefit event "Golden Sats." Only about 500 people have participated so far, it's hardly competitive, and it’s about to end. I want to share it with everyone today:

First, let's briefly talk about: What exactly is Rootstock?
Some friends might not have heard of it, but it’s actually a well-established player in the BTC ecosystem—launched on mainnet in 2018, with zero downtime and no hacking incidents, it’s a proven BTC smart contract layer.

The core idea is simple: add a “DeFi feature set” to Bitcoin, without compromising the security of the BTC main chain.

Security: relies on “merged mining,” with over 80% of BTC network hash power endorsing it, and transaction fees are shared with BTC miners, effectively tying its security deeply to BTC;

Practicality: compatible with EVM (the same development tools as ETH), so DeFi activities on ETH (lending, swapping, staking) can all be done here;

Convenience: BTC can be pegged 1:1 to rBTC (programmable BTC on Rootstock), no need to sell BTC, directly use rBTC for DeFi, saving the hassle of token swaps;

Latest upgrade: gas fees reduced by 60%, future block time will be shortened from 30 seconds to 5 seconds, making the experience smoother.

Its ecosystem token $RIF is the “fuel” driving the entire ecosystem—staking allows participation in DAO governance, exchanging for stablecoins, buying domain names, and it will be used in this event. Major exchanges (Binance, Bitget, Gate) all support trading.

Follow the Chinese account @RootstockCN for the latest ecosystem updates and benefit activities—no need to translate English news anymore.

Now, the key question: Why is the Golden Sats event worth participating in?

This is Rootstock’s community reward event, with a total prize of $500,000, plus a raffle for 2 blue-chip NFTs "Lil Pudgy." The main reasons are:

Low participation threshold: you can join with just a few dozen dollars, with basic DeFi tasks;

Very little competition: currently, only about 500+ participants on Galaxy platform, much easier to win than events where thousands compete;

Very urgent: it ends tomorrow, so there’s still time to join fully!

Here’s the event link:

Check out the tutorial with pictures—it’s simple and easy to understand: