DeDust: Token Swaps on TON

You can swap one token for another without an exchange account, documents or a wait for withdrawal: a wallet is enough. DeDust does this on the TON blockchain, and the Telegram mini app opens trading right from the messenger. But freedom has a price: everything you confirm is final. 🔄

Let us look at how such an exchange works, where its fees come from and where beginners most often lose money.

An exchange with no order book

DeDust is an automated market maker (AMM). On a regular exchange, your orders meet other people's orders in a book. Here, trades run through liquidity pools: other users deposit pairs of tokens, and a smart contract swaps them using a formula.

The price depends on the ratio of assets in the pool. The more money in the pool, the less your trade moves the price. On small pools a swap slips noticeably.

What a swap looks like

1. Connect a wallet to the mini app and approve access.
2. Pick a token pair and enter the amount.
3. Review the rate, fee and slippage. The app shows the expected result.
4. Confirm the transaction in your wallet.

Besides the pool fee you pay TON network gas. It is usually small, but your wallet must hold the right coin.

Fees and pools

The swap fee depends on the pool. It is shown on the pool's own page, along with how it splits between liquidity providers and holders of the protocol token. Sources quote different base values, so go by the figure in the app rather than by articles.

There are two kinds of pools: volatile ones for ordinary pairs and stable ones for tokens that should cost roughly the same, such as stablecoins. Stable pairs generally carry lower fees.

Liquidity: income or trap

When you put two coins into a pool, you receive LP tokens and a share of the fees. It sounds like passive income, but there is a non-obvious risk called impermanent loss.

If one token's price moves far from the other's, you can end up with less than if you had just held the coins. Fees do not always make up for it.

• Impermanent loss. The proportions of your share change.
• Smart contract risk. Any code bug can turn into losses.
• Junk tokens. Anyone can create a token and open a pool that holds no real value.

Keeping your money

Crypto trading is dangerous for beginners. Practice with small amounts first and only use funds you can afford to lose. Do not promise yourself quick income. ⚠️

• Verify the token through official sources: names of popular tokens are often faked.
• Never enter a seed phrase anywhere except your own wallet.
• Read the confirmation window. Amount, recipient and permissions should match what you expect.
• Set sensible slippage. A value that is too high lets bots trade against you at a bad rate.

Who needs it

DeDust suits people who already have a TON wallet and want to swap tokens without a middleman. If you are just getting to know crypto, first learn how wallets and confirmations work.

The mini app is convenient because it opens where you already chat. Just remember that convenience does not reduce market risk. 🔐