Opinion of: Alisia Painter, chief of the Botanix Labs exploitation
Without Ethereum, the industry would not be where it is today in terms of decentralized finance (DEFI), making programmability a key characteristic of blockchains and proving the value of intelligent contracts on a large scale. The Ethereum virtual machine has become the essential platform for developers, with the largest ecosystem and tools.
As Defi matures, however, is it worth asking it: is Ethereum the best foundation for the future of financial innovation? Well, the answer could be bitcoin.
With nearly $ 6 billion of total value locked in March 2025, decentralization, liquidity and Bitcoin resilience position it as the natural house for the next ONCHAIN finance era, and although the flexibility of Ethereum has enabled an explosion of experimentation, this same flexibility is accompanied by compromise.
Vulnerabilities in the intelligent contracts that we have seen in renowned hacks to current debates on scalability, Ethereum’s experimental ethics left cracks in its foundation. On the other hand, Bitcoin offers a solid infrastructure and tested in combat where DEFI can flourish in a lasting way and cross the degens chasm in traditional adoption.
The contribution and limitations of Ethereum
Ethereum was responsible for the pioneer of what we know how to be paraded today. This innovation and development have served as a test field for what Bitcoin is capable and can ultimately achieve. Its programmability has enabled developers to create everything, from automated loan platforms to sophisticated derivatives. These products exist only due to the intelligent contract capacities of Ethereum.
With this flexibility came from serious compromise, and we saw them playing in real time. The Hack Dao in 2016 drained $ 50 million and almost killed Ethereum in its infancy. The feat in 2022 Wormhole cost $ 325 million in recent years, and the hacking of Ronin Bridge has taken $ 620 million.
They were not only bad luck – they are the foreseeable result of Ethereum’s open programmability. Intelligent contracts are powerful, but they are also complex. The complexity generates vulnerability. Solidity simply was not designed with safety as main consideration.
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At the same time, the challenge challenges have made it more and more inaccessible.
Congestion of the network and gas costs reach hundreds of dollars during peak periods have effectively locked average users. Seasoned users will be very well used to the attractive gas costs necessary to make basic exchanges during high congestion of the network. Layer 2 solutions like optimism and arbitrum have made great progress, but they fragment liquidity and introduce their own confidence assumptions.
This does not mean that Ethereum fails. This is not the case. As DEFI matures beyond its experimental phase and becomes more common in global finance, we must ask ourselves whether it is logical to continue to rely on this foundation or to consider a more resilient alternative.
Why Bitcoin?
Bitcoin design philosophy is radically different. It is not an unlimited experimentation platform; It is a fortress of stability. His philosophy of conservative development and his consensus of proof of work make Bitcoin the most secure blockchain. This guarantee results in confidence – a critical ingredient for applications to giant billions of dollars in value.
Liquidity is another advantage that Bitcoin offers. With a market capitalization that eclipses ether (ETH), Bitcoin (BTC) is the most liquid cryptocurrency, making it an ideal base layer for Defi. The rise of technologies such as the Lightning network of Bitcoin and failures like Spiderchain already unlock Bitcoin potential for intelligent contracts, offering programmability developers that developers need without sacrificing security or scalability.
Not all Bitcoin projects are created equal
Many so-called Bitcoin L2S and Sidechains claim to be “native of bitcoin”, offering applications the promise to take advantage of the intrinsic Bitcoin security properties.
Let’s restore the records: many are not really native of Bitcoin.
Without pointing their fingers, these projects are often based on guardian multisig configurations, Bitcoin bridge towards Ethereum or another chain, then build rolls on top. Although there is nothing intrinsically bad with this approach, and there will be user cases that will work with this set of confidence hypotheses, it is not the same as being built natively on Bitcoin.
The real Bitcoin L2 are designed directly on Bitcoin, explaining its liquidity, safety and resilience – qualities that resisted the test of time. If we want to expand the capacities defi, we must build them on Bitcoin. It is a simple demand, but the trouble to be repeated because we see major actors exploring paths that may not be aligned fully with the Bitcoin potential.
The long -term path
The debate should not be supervised like Ethereum against Bitcoin. It is a false binary. Ethereum’s innovation approach has been crucial to prove what is possible, and it remains an essential center of DEFI experimentation. Bitcoin offers something that Ethereum does not do: a foundation that has already won the wider financial confidence.
Users should not have to choose between safety and features. Bitcoin resilience is combined with sophisticated financial tools similar to those launched by Ethereum. Some of the most exciting work that is currently occurring are at this intersection.
For Defi to keep his promise to create a fair, open and inclusive financial system, he must go beyond his experimental phase. It must be sure that average people can use it without fear of losing everything in the feat. It needs liquidity deep enough to support the financial activity of the real world. And this requires the type of institutional confidence that only Bitcoin has obtained.
The future of finance will be built on Bitcoin not because Ethereum has failed, but because Bitcoin provides the bases that finance requires.
Opinion of: Alisia Painter, chief of the Botanix Labs exploitation
This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and must not be considered as legal or investment advice. The points of view, the thoughts and opinions expressed here are the only of the author and do not reflect or do not necessarily represent the opinions and opinions of Cointellegraph.
