PancakeSwap is a decentralized exchange based on the BNB Smart Chain. It was introduced by a team of anonymous developers in September 2020. In their first Medium post, they noted that one of the things that differentiate PancakeSwap from other “farms” is its focus on gamification.
PancakeSwap utilizes an automated market maker model (AMM) which allows users to exchange crypto assets with the help of user-generated liquidity pools. The trades themselves are done with the use of BEP-20 tokens and an Ethereum bridge. At the same time, PancakeSwap is cheaper and faster than other food-related exchanges, due to the fact that it is built on the Binance Smart Chain. The CAKE token powers the PancakeSwap ecosystem. It can be used for staking, in Yield Farms to earn more CAKE, to vote on proposals, to create a Pancake Profile to start minting NFTs and even to buy lottery tickets for PancakeSwap Lottery. CAKE tokens are burnt regularly in several ways in order to avoid CAKE inflation, as there is no hard cap.
Each week PancakeSwap gives qualifying projects an opportunity to bid to enter an auction where they can win the ability to host a 7-day Farm. Such a process is titled the Community Farm Auction and gives projects a chance to gain visibility with potential investors.