Chainlink has introduced the Chainlink Reserve, an on-chain mechanism that accumulates LINK tokens using both off-chain enterprise payments and on-chain application fees. The reserve is intended to strengthen the long-term sustainability and development of the Chainlink Network, the company announced Thursday.
At the core of this initiative is Payment Abstraction, a system that allows users to pay for Chainlink services in cryptocurrencies like ETH or USDC. These payments are then automatically converted into LINK through decentralized exchanges and Chainlink’s own infrastructure. The converted tokens are deposited into the reserve.
The reserve has already accrued over $1 million in LINK, with no planned withdrawals for “multiple years,” according to Chainlink. As institutional and protocol-level usage grows, the reserve is expected to expand steadily, forming a foundational pool to support ongoing network development and security.
“The Chainlink Reserve represents a major evolution for the network,” said Sergey Nazarov, Chainlink co-founder. “It channels revenue from both on-chain and off-chain sources directly into LINK, reflecting strong enterprise demand that’s already generated hundreds of millions of dollars.”
Key institutional users fueling this reserve include Mastercard, which partnered with Chainlink to enable on-chain crypto payments, and JPMorgan, whose Kinexys Digital Payments platform utilizes Chainlink tech through integration with Ondo Chain.
Chainlink has also released a public dashboard to track the reserve’s balance at reserve.chain.link, alongside the reserve’s smart contract details available on Etherscan.
