Kraken’s Layer 2 Ink Unveils Token Launch and Airdrop

Kraken, the second-largest centralized exchange by volume in the United States, launched Ink, its Ethereum Layer 2 network, in December 2024. Less than seven months later, the Ink Foundation has announced the impending launch of its INK token.

The foundation said it “envisions a future where INK powers a robust DeFi ecosystem governed by its users and aligned with their success.” It also clarified that the INK token will not play a role in governance of the chain, but that the INK supply is “permanently capped and not subject to change.”

INK’s first use case is to bolster liquidity for the chain’s DeFi ecosystem, with the token expected to play a pivotal role in a liquidity protocol powered by Aave, the largest lending protocol in DeFi.

Tokenomics are not yet public, but the post clarified that there will be an airdrop of INK for users of the liquidity protocol. However, it is unclear if other DeFi activities on the chain will be eligible for the INK airdrop. The foundation also stated that the token distribution will be “undertaken by a wholly owned subsidiary of the Ink Foundation” as opposed to the foundation itself.

Ink, which was originally announced in October 2024, launched its mainnet on December 16, 2024 and racked up more than 1 million transactions in the first 24 hours.

However, transaction volume has not correlated to overall liquidity on the chain, which maintains a total value locked (TVL) of just $7 million. The metric reached an all-time high in May, reaching $8.9 million.

While the chain is in its early stages, its TVL is dwarfed by competitors such as Coinbase’s Layer 2, Base, which boasts a TVL of $3.7 billion, and Mantle, a Layer 2 with ties to Bybit, which holds $210 million in DeFi TVL.