Why Interoperability is a Distraction for Core Infrastructure Builders

Interoperability protocols like LayerZero and Axelar add consensus overhead, directly conflicting with the goal of minimizing latency and maximizing TPS. The focus must be on local state execution.

• Solana and Monad prioritize single-shard performance, targeting 10k+ TPS and ~400ms block times.
• Cross-chain messaging introduces 2-20 second finality delays and new security assumptions.

A chain's security is its most critical product. Relying on external validators from Wormhole or Polygon AggLayer creates a hard dependency and a new attack surface.

• The security budget should fund native validator incentives and client diversity, not third-party bridge staking.
• High-performance chains like Aptos and Sui invest in robust, parallelized VMs, making their state the primary asset to secure.

Building for a fragmented multi-chain world forces developers to manage inconsistent primitives, gas tokens, and tooling. This destroys iteration speed.

• EVM chains focus on a unified execution environment; Sei V2 and Neon EVM optimize for this single paradigm.
• The winning stack provides superior local developer experience first, letting aggregators like UniswapX handle cross-chain liquidity later.

Cross-chain liquidity is inherently fragmented and stale. Protocols like dYdX and Aevo build their own app-chains to keep liquidity and order flow native, maximizing capital efficiency.

• Native liquidity enables sub-second trade settlement and unified margin systems, impossible with bridging delays.
• Celestia-style DA layers prove the thesis: decouple data availability, but fiercely optimize execution locally.

Bridges like LayerZero and Axelar create synthetic assets that fracture liquidity across chains, increasing systemic risk. The real problem isn't moving value, but securing it.

• Key Risk: Creates $10B+ in unbacked or undercollateralized assets.
• Core Distraction: Builders focus on 'wrapping' instead of native scaling solutions like ZK-rollups.
• Result: Every new chain multiplies the attack surface without solving base-layer security.

Most 'decentralized' bridges rely on a ~10-20 entity multisig or a permissioned validator set. This is a softer, more attractive target than a $50B+ L1 like Ethereum.

• Key Risk: Concentrated failure point for $2B+ in bridge hacks since 2022.
• Core Distraction: Teams optimize for finality speed, not validator set decentralization.
• Result: Wormhole, Multichain, and Ronin incidents prove this is the dominant failure mode.

UniswapX and CowSwap abstract routing via solvers, but still depend on canonical bridges for cross-chain settlement. They shift, not eliminate, the trust assumption.

• Key Benefit: Better UX and price execution.
• Key Limitation: Final settlement relies on the same vulnerable bridge infrastructure.
• Result: A solver can fail, but a bridge can get robbed. Infrastructure builders should focus on the latter.

Proposals like Astria or Espresso to share sequencers across rollups are interoperability for builders. They introduce a new, critical centralization layer between L1 and L2.

• Key Risk: Re-creates the validator centralization problem at the sequencing layer.
• Core Distraction: Diverts effort from building robust, self-sufficient rollup stacks.
• Result: Adds complexity and a new liveness dependency for marginal throughput gains.

Every cross-chain message introduces latency, cost, and security dilution. Builders optimizing for ~500ms finality and <$0.01 fees get penalized by bridging overhead that can add seconds and dollars. The market's best L1s (Solana) and L2s (Arbitrum, Base) won by ignoring this problem first.

• Key Benefit 1: Eliminate external dependencies that break your performance guarantees.
• Key Benefit 2: Achieve product-market fit on a single chain before abstracting liquidity.

Interoperability protocols (LayerZero, Wormhole, Axelar) are new trust layers with their own validator sets and failure modes. You inherit their economic security, not Ethereum's. A bridge hack is now your hack. The $2B+ in cross-chain bridge exploits proves this is the weakest link.

• Key Benefit 1: Rely on the canonical security of your settlement layer (e.g., Ethereum L1).
• Key Benefit 2: Avoid the complexity of monitoring and auditing multiple external cryptoeconomic systems.

Intent-based architectures (UniswapX, CowSwap) and universal front-ends abstract chain selection for users, not builders. Your protocol should be uniquely excellent on one chain before becoming mediocre on ten. Fragmented liquidity and inconsistent state are UX killers that interoperability can't magically solve.

• Key Benefit 1: Deliver a seamless, fast, and predictable user experience on a single execution environment.
• Key Benefit 2: Build deep, sticky liquidity that becomes a moat, not a bridged afterthought.

Modular stacks (Celestia, EigenDA) separate execution, settlement, and data availability. This creates native interoperability problems between rollups that builders must now solve. Focusing on monolithic performance (like Solana) or a tightly-integrated rollup stack (like the OP Stack) often yields better results than chasing a fragmented, 'optimal' modular setup from day one.

• Key Benefit 1: Reduce coordination overhead and integration complexity.
• Key Benefit 2: Achieve tighter vertical integration for superior performance and simpler state management.