Ex-Marginfi Co-Founder Joins Paladin to Combat Sandwich Attacks
Edgar Pavlovsky, former co-founder of Marginfi, left the Solana DeFi project in April 2024 due to disagreements regarding operations. He is now a core contributor to Paladin, a Solana client designed to prevent sandwich attacks and enhance validator rewards.
Simultaneously, Temporal, a crypto research firm linked to Marginfi, launched Nozomi, another Solana client aimed at countering sandwich attacks. While both projects target similar issues, they implement different strategies. Paladin incorporates a token called PAL, whereas Marginfi has yet to release a native token amid user criticism.
Nozomi prioritizes transaction speed and prevents sandwich attacks by restricting transactions to trusted validators. Jakob Povsic, a developer at Temporal, asserts that Nozomi democratizes trading by providing institutional-level transaction precision to regular users.
Paladin, a fork of the Jito-Solana client, focuses on identifying and blocking sandwich attacks within transaction bundles. Pavlovsky stated that Paladin prioritizes higher-fee transactions and will eventually restrict access through the PAL token. Despite their similarities, Pavlovsky supports Temporal's initiatives, believing multiple projects can coexist.
Povsic criticized Paladin's approach as “naive” and accused it of arbitrarily blocking transactions, while also questioning the complexity introduced by its token model. Pavlovsky countered these claims, asserting that Paladin’s methods are systematic and rigorously tested against network-wide sandwiching strategies.
Ben Coverston, a partner at Temporal, noted that Paladin's token incentives could lead to exploitation, contrasting this with Nozomi’s clear focus on transaction speed and validator trust. He highlighted Nozomi’s open-source philosophy, suggesting it mitigates potential issues associated with Paladin's token-based model.
The absence of a Marginfi token remains contentious. Many platforms reward users with points prior to token launches, but Marginfi has not pursued this strategy. Pavlovsky expressed support for launching a token, deeming Q4 2023 an appropriate timeframe, though he did not explicitly connect this to his departure.
Both Paladin and Nozomi tackle significant challenges within Solana’s validator ecosystem, yet their approaches and philosophies differ markedly. The landscape is characterized by a blend of collaboration, rivalry, and differing visions for Solana’s decentralized finance future.