AlphaGrowth Raises Potential FastLane Collaboration While Exploring Cardano Liquid Staking

AlphaGrowth is considering approaches to liquid staking on Cardano, with Bryan Colligan raising the possibility of exploring a collaboration with FastLane during a discussion about the company’s work on Monad.

Speaking with FastLane’s Tom Murphy on Dose of Alpha LIVE, Colligan referred to a $20 million Cardano ecosystem fund and described AlphaGrowth’s interest in liquid staking opportunities. He suggested that some of FastLane’s models could be worth considering for Cardano.

The conversation did not establish a partnership, a Cardano product or an integration timeline. Murphy’s presentation focused on infrastructure and applications developed for Monad.

From Monad Infrastructure to Cardano Ideas

FastLane works with validators and developed shMON, a liquid staking token on Monad. Liquid staking generally involves staking an underlying asset and receiving a corresponding token that may be used in supported DeFi applications.

Murphy reported that approximately 68% of Monad’s staked weight was connected to FastLane’s validator MEV auction at the time of the interview, across about 118 validators. He explained that FastLane works with validators rather than operating them. The figure describes stake associated with validators connected to the auction; it does not mean FastLane owns or directly controls those tokens.

Cardano users can already delegate ADA to a stake pool while retaining control of their funds and keeping them available to transact. A token representing a staking position could serve a different purpose: enabling that representation to be used in compatible DeFi applications. The permissions, benefits and risks would depend on how a particular product is designed.

Murphy also described potential sources of value for shMON beyond ordinary staking rewards, including revenue associated with validator MEV and an oracle-related arrangement he expected to develop further on Monad. He did not provide an exact figure for the contribution from validator MEV.

MEV, or maximal extractable value, can arise from the inclusion, exclusion or ordering of blockchain transactions. Murphy also discussed oracle extractable value, which can emerge around price updates and events such as liquidations on lending protocols.

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Trading Tools and Liquidity on Monad

The conversation also covered Moose, FastLane’s trading application, which Murphy described as being in open beta. According to Murphy, its aggregator checks trading venues during execution to address cases where a displayed quote changes before a transaction is completed.

FastLane is also exploring automated strategies, including grid bots that place trades at predefined price levels. Murphy noted that the approach does not guarantee a profit, as results depend on the asset and market conditions.

AlphaGrowth’s Kyle Jacobs asked whether Moose could help facilitate swaps from shMON collateral into USDC for a vault being developed for FastLane. Murphy described the idea as a potential use case, while Jacobs indicated that the vault was nearing the end of its audit process.

The participants also discussed the importance of liquidity when entering and exiting positions. Murphy described an instant unstaking pool within the shMON system and noted that decentralized exchange liquidity affects the execution of larger swaps.

What Colligan Proposed for Cardano

Colligan raised the Cardano connection after Murphy explained FastLane’s products. He indicated that AlphaGrowth was considering different liquid staking approaches for the ecosystem and suggested that some of FastLane’s work could be worth exploring together.

The interview did not explain how the Monad models might be adapted to Cardano or identify a proposed Cardano token, vault or other product. The discussion instead identified an area for potential exploration: whether approaches used in FastLane’s validator and DeFi infrastructure could inform future work involving Cardano.