What is Maya Protocol?

Maya Protocol is an ecosystem of chains, and its live chain, MAYAChain, is a friendly fork of THORChain that swaps coins from several chains. Its native coin is CACAO, which pays network fees and settles swaps between other coins.

Also called MAYAChain or Maya.

What MAYAChain is

MAYAChain works like an exchange that draws liquidity from several chains. Its docs describe it as a friendly fork of THORChain, which means it began from THORChain's code and now runs as a separate network.

Its getting-started guide lists Bitcoin, Ethereum, THORChain, Zcash, Dash, Kujira, Arbitrum and Radix as native chains.

CACAO

CACAO is the native asset of MAYAChain. It sits on one side of every pool, which makes it the settlement asset for swaps between any two other coins, and it is the currency charged for network fees.

Related terms

THORChainTHORChain is a network that swaps native coins across chains, such as Bitcoin for Ether, with no bridges and no wrapped tokens. The coins sit in vaults on their home chains, secured by about 100 independent node operators.RUNERUNE is THORChain’s native asset. Node operators bond it to take part in the network, and it sits on one side of every pool of liquidity, so a swap from Bitcoin to Ether runs from BTC to RUNE to ETH in one flow.Native cross-chain swapA native cross-chain swap trades a coin on one chain for a coin on another, for example Bitcoin for Ether, by moving the real coins between vaults instead of minting wrapped copies on a bridge.Liquidity poolA THORChain liquidity pool sets the price of a swap from the balances in the pool. The bigger the trade compared with the pool, the larger the slip, and that slip is the fee paid to liquidity providers.THORNameA THORName is a human-readable name on THORChain that points to addresses on several chains. Affiliates use one to collect fees, and it stays registered until the blocks it was paid for run out.

Sources: Maya Protocol documentation · Frequently asked questions, Maya Protocol documentation · Getting started, Maya Protocol documentation

Updated November 1, 2026. All terms