World Liberty Financial (WLFI), a DeFi project backed by US President-elect Donald Trump, has partnered with Chainlink to accelerate DeFi adoption.
This new alliance, announced on November 14, designates Chainlink as WLFI’s primary provider for on-chain data and cross-chain connectivity. The Oracle blockchain network would support the upcoming launch of the DeFi project on the Ethereum mainnet.
In the first phase of this integration, WLFI will adopt Chainlink’s price feeds on the Ethereum mainnet, enabling the secure integration of digital assets such as USDC, USDT, ETH and WBTC for the Aave v3 protocol instance of WLFI. The WLFI governance platform should approve this integration.
Chainlink co-founder Sergey Nazarov noted that the network’s established security and reliability make it a wise choice for WLFI’s infrastructure needs. He also said that the collaboration between the two platforms would allow the Trump-related project to attract users who value reliable technology within DeFi.
Financial challenges
The decision to integrate Chainlink comes as WLFI faces challenges in meeting its financial goals.
Initially aiming to raise $300 million, the project later reduced its goal to $30 million due to low demand from crypto investors. Despite this reduction, data from its website shows that the project fell short of its revised funding goals, raising less than $20 million from 1.3 billion tokens sold.
World Liberty Financial considers itself a DeFi hub where users can lend, borrow and invest in digital assets. The project said it aims to provide users with information and access to third-party DeFi applications that would support the adoption of US dollar-based stablecoins and ensure that the dollar remains the global reserve currency.
The WLFI token is at the heart of the project’s mission. This asset would allow holders to vote on protocol decisions and actively participate in shaping the future of the platform.
However, the project has attracted heavy criticism from members of the crypto community. A report from asset management firm Galaxy Digital noted that WLFI currently functions more as an idea than a fully developed protocol.
Galaxy added that there is a lot of uncertainty about the project’s trajectory, as there is little information about the details of the project, its finalized development plan, and the code releases needed. He added:
“Key dependencies of the project are not guaranteed, with the Aave license still pending, and the market is unconvinced about the future of the protocol, even with crypto trending more Republican.”
