Omkar Godbole Omkar Godbole was a senior reporter on CoinDesk's Markets team. Follow @ godbole17 on Twitter Interest in bridging bitcoin (BTC) to the Avalanche smart contract blockchain (BTC. b) continues to swell as the supply of wrapped bitcoin (wBTC), the largest wrapped version of bitcoin on Ethereum, dwindles. On Thursday, over 2,000 BTC ($44 million) was ported to Avalanche, the largest single-day BTC. b mint on record, according to data sourced from pseudonymous analyst 0xAcid 's dashboard on Dune Analytics. That has lifted the total circulating supply of BTC. b to 8,572. According to 0xAcid, half of the bitcoin minted on Thursday has been moved to BENQI Finance. BENQI Finance is an Avalanche-based decentralized finance protocol, which allows users to lend, borrow and earn additional yields from digital assets. In June 2022, Avalanche added support for bitcoin on its cross-chain bridge, allowing BTC holders to deploy their coins in the Avalanche-based decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem to generate extra yield. BTC. b has seen impressive growth since then, surpassing the number of coins held in the Lightning Network. A crypto bridge is a tool that facilitates interactions between the two economically and technologically separate blockchains. Bridges became a target of hackers last year, accounting for about 70% of the total exploits in the crypto industry last year, according to forensics firm Chainalysis. (Dune Analytics) The record BTC. b mint comes as the WBTC supply fell by 15% to 153,164 in February, reaching the lowest since March 2021. Apparently, bankrupt crypto lender Celsius, a well-known WBTC holder, redeemed a large amount of WBTC, causing a sharp drop in the token's supply. WBTC, issued by Bitgo, is an ERC-20 token based on the Ethereum network with its price pegged 1: with bitcoin. The token's supply peaked at 285,000 in April last year and has been falling ever since. The Avalanche community considers BTC. b a better option than WBTC, considering Avalanche offers users the ability to mint and redeem BTC. b anytime with the bridge in a non-custodial browser extension Core, eliminating the need for intermediaries. It provides more control to users, unlike WBTC, which relies on merchants to initiate the process of minting and burning. According to Emperor Osmo, an anonymous writer for Cosmos-based automated market maker Osmosis, the investors in AVAX, the native token of Avalanche, are yet to take notice of BTC's growing use in DeFI, as evidenced by BTC. b's rising supply. "Over $200M of BTC has been bridged to Avalanche [to date]. The BTC DeFi narrative is definitely not priced in for AVAX," Osmo tweeted early Friday. At press time, AVAX traded nearly 6% lower on the day, near $16, the lowest since Jan. 20. The cryptocurrency has seen a 50% appreciation in its market value this year, per CoinDesk data . DISCLOSURE Please note that our privacy policy , terms of use , cookies , and do not sell my personal information has been updated . The leader in news and information on cryptocurrency, digital assets and the future of money, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies . CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group , which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups . As part of their compensation, certain CoinDesk employees, including editorial employees, may receive exposure to DCG equity in the form of stock appreciation rights , which vest over a multi-year period. CoinDesk journalists are not allowed to purchase stock outright in DCG . Omkar Godbole Omkar Godbole was a senior reporter on CoinDesk's Markets team. Follow @ godbole17 on Twitter Learn more about Consensus 2023 , CoinDesk’s longest-running and most influential event that brings together all sides of crypto, blockchain and Web3. Head to consensus. coindesk. com to register and buy your pass now. Omkar Godbole Omkar Godbole was a senior reporter on CoinDesk's Markets team. Follow @ godbole17 on Twitter.