I am very happy to discuss such things with everyone!
A bit late to the conversation but as a long-term follower of Gnosis and very active user of several DeFi projects, I would suggest to separate tokens for each protocol/product.
First, there is definitely a “stigma” towards $GNO because of lack of narrative as you mentioned @mkoeppelmann, so better to keep it separated when launching a new product. However, if a clearer direction of GNO can be established, the community should look into following Synthetixs approach of spinning of projects. But for this GP and GNO needs to position itself as something like a “Ethereum Incubator” or something similar considering the products you already released.
With Synthetix, the narrative is very clear: staking SNX as collateral to mint sUSD. This narrative is clear, has rewarded many users and managed to build a great community of DeFi OGs. Since then, they have released a bunch of products and are now in the process of separating some of their products to their own individual projects (with strong ties to Synthetix obviously). Thales and Lyra recently spun off and are showing good signs of community development and token structures/distribution, all while maintaining strong ties to their “launchpad” Synthetix.
This is something GP could do but would require a strong(er) narrative of the protocol. If we look at CowSwap, there is not that much from previous GP products that is directly supporting the mission of CowSwap (correct me if Im wrong please). So if a clear GP narrative is missing, I would tend to separate CowSwap into its own token while maintaining ties to GP. GP is definitely a seal of approval for all early Ethereum users.
With that in mind, it would make most sense to reward anyone actively participating into the CowSwap community and we already heard a few good initiatives:
- early users of CowSwap (based on trades/volume but with limit towards whales)
- POAP for participation in testing, community calls, etc
- airdrop GNO holders (similar to SNX)
In any case, loving the conversation here and looking forward to more on this!
4 Likes
yeee, i am very happy and cant wait:)
Yes, a cowswap specific token is the way to go
I think 1inch and Uniswap airdrops are good models for other exchanges. Both tokens have traded in a very healthy manner after the distribution to early network participants
@mkoeppelmann This is an extension to option 2, airdrop to GNO-holders:
Ve-assets (Curve) has the best tokenomics design in our industry that would allow to flourish a whole ecosystem around a parent token like GNO.
Several projects have recently implemented this model like iceCREAM, veFXS, vKP3r, and oSUSHI
In a similar fashion, we could have veGNO, a non-transferable token minted from the long term staking of GNO.
1 GNO locked for 4 years = 1 veGNO
1 GNO locked for 3 years = 0.75 veGNO
1 GNO locked for 2 years = 0.5 veGNO
1 GNO locked for 1 years = 0.25 veGNO
We could implement rewards to veGNO holders like GP token weekly airdrops, GP fees, discounts, bribes and eventually other projects token airdrops.
Only people who are aligned with the long term success of GNO would get the benefits
I see 2 main drawbacks for this model:
-Reduced supply increases asset volatility
-Capital inefficiency for having a locked asset
Aave understood these issues very well and they designed stkAaave. Stkaave is an staked representation of an Aave/eth 80/20 Balancer pool that acts as an insurance layer for the protocol (Safety Module) and accrues rewards for locking the tokens. Stkaave somehow reduces the supply while maintaining a healthy level of Aave liquidity.
If we commit to provide long term liquidity to GNO and ETH on a 80/20 Balancer pool, we might be able to get the positive effects from both Curve and Aave’s models:
1 BPT (X ETH+1GNO) locked for 4 years = 1 longGNO
1 BPT (X ETH+1GNO) locked for 3 years = 0.75 longGNO
1 BPT (X ETH+1GNO) locked for 2 years = 0.5 longGNO
1 BPT (X ETH+1GNO) locked for 1 years = 0.25 longGNO
GNO holders are natural ETH holders, so holding both tokens should not be an issue.
This way we could have the ve-assets long term benefits with a healthy and liquid GNO market. Gnosis partnership with Balancer would be also be strengthened
4 Likes
I like the ve-asset proposal for GNO.
I agree that for many DAOs with a long-term vision of x-years, they are better off by introducing x-year lock periods, as you describe. They benefit as:
- They align communities on the long-term rather on the short-term.
- Governance decisions are better, as they are done with a focus on long-term success rather shortterm gains.
- It allows smaller players, who don’t have soo much GNO, to leverage their impact by commiting and locking tokens.
Due to these reasons, I believe that GNO should also introduce veGNO or longGNO. But I am having a little bit of doubt that this introduction of veGNO or longGNO can be done before the GP-token launch.
On the other hand you are right @claberus, that if we the GNODAO community wants to build a community with longGNO holders, new tokenrelease are perfect times, where people would want to lock down their GNO in order to get a bigger share of the newly issued tokens.
3 Likes
I really like this proposal.
Do you know if Aave allows both, simple locking of the token and locking of pool tokens or only locking of pool tokens?
Maybe we can piggyback on Aave’s code and reduce implementation time on our end.
1 Like
Yes, Aave allows both. Stkaave has a cooldown period of 10 days so it doesn’t get the benefits of a long term non-transferable token.
@calberus
Certainly an interesting option.
I am a bit torn apart - on the one hand, I am certainly all for “long-term incentives” on the other hand I think the “option to exit” is also important. Specifically, GnosisDAO has a lot of freedom regarding what it could do/ how it could develop. With projects like Curve it seems quite well defined what they are trying to accomplish - with Gnosis the spectrum of activities is much broader (Safe, GP, Zodiac, Gnosis Auction, Conditional Token, Open Ethereum, Yield farming, Ideas around OWL… (just to mention a few)). So with likely Safe and GP spinning out the range of possibilities where to put focus next is large. In such a situation it also feels problematic to let people commit to GNO without knowing the direction the project will take.
So I think the very least that would be required is some understanding that if major decisions are made (that potential chance the direction of Gnosis/GNO) GnosisDAO should offer something like a fair “rage quit”. Something along the lines that those who vote against a specific proposal can get an option to sell even locked GNO if the DAO decides against their vote.
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I guess short term speculators or users who don’t buy Gnosis vision could lock for a shorter period of time or just “rage quit” and sell GNO any time. Any future reward is already priced in GNO due to the uncertainties you mentioned.
Removing users with doubts is exactly the goal of locking GNO. We need investors focused in the long game, willing to continue betting for GNO even during bear markets.
Being forced to be long an asset has also an interest effect on the investor’s psychology, I experienced this as a 4 years’veCRV holder. Even during moments of doubts, you are incentivised to be bullish and support the project because basically you don’t have a choice.
1 Like
Hey guys, Fernando from Balancer here. Really enjoying the discussion!
Interestingly our community came to the same conclusion: that a mechanism for long-term staking/locking that boosts vote power and liquidity mining incentives is highly desired. It ensures the alignment of incentives of token holders: the longer you lock your tokens, the longer you’ll be exposed to the consequences of your votes.
This is the proposal that Balancer governance approved: [Proposal] Staking of BPT for Economic and Governance Benefits - #37 by StefanoBury_LongHash - General Proposal - Balancer
The idea is to do the same as AAVE and stake/lock 80/20 BAL/ETH BPTs instead of pure BAL. This avoids drying up BAL liquidity and instead ensures a lot of liquidity. There are other teams considering this same approach to, which is based on this article by Joel Monegro. Those who don’t want to be exposed to ETH could still use BAL to vote, but they would not have a boost as those who lock up BPTs would.
We also discussed having a way for stakers/lockers to withdraw their tokens earlier, but we decided for simplicity that this should not be possible. As @claberus mentioned, if you are not sure you want to be in for the long-run you can just choose a shorter lockup duration.
One thing though that we were considering is to have some global option for everyone to withdraw their tokens if something major happens, like a system upgrade or migration where tokens would need to be liquid. That would be voted by governance and would only happen in extreme cases.
The Balancer Labs team is looking into coding this in solidity since we don’t want to mix Curve’s vyper with our solidity based code. So we’d probably be coding this from scratch.
Curious if you would like to get involved and send us some features you’d like to see in this. We want to keep this as simple as possible though.
Cheers!
5 Likes
Great idea for the token for GP. Speaking as a GNO holder, cowswap user and poap holder.
Brief thoughts-
-Not against a lock-up of GNO per se, in fact I see the advantages in it for sure, but one years sounds like a lot (but not out of the realm of credulity) and 4 years is simply too long without any “get out” mechanism. That kind of defeats the object of the lock up though, doesn’t it? Perhaps some kind of time-weighted staking system that in effect compounds your access given the length of time staked. Have no idea what the feasibility of such a system would be though.
- To prevent unnecessary pumping of GNO to get the GP drops, just ensure the snapshot is taken before the announcement.
-Good to distribute among early users, but I don’t think it’s necessary to give the poap holders any specific consideration over other early users (not to any large degree anyway). The reward for testers already came in the form of the poap and the subsidized fees, no? Again, snapshot before announcement makes more sense. - Can’t see any reason to give priority to Eth users over xDai users.
- Further to the above about early users, set a minimum trade limit on trades that qualify for any drop (a nominal amount, say $40-50 or something) to avoid distribution going to a ton of wallets from single owners that made $2 USDC to DAI trades.
1 Like
To me, the biggest benefit is being able to participate in governance and with this broaden the possible base for future developments, as long as there is a broad distribution.
I think I like the sound of this. Definitely gives incentive for new users to enter market
How do you become a solver？
i love you GNO token
Yes ! There is no better way to maximize cowswap potential by decentralizing all the protocol. Let more ppl know about Gnosis Safe & MEV protection 
That will be a good idea, if it doesn’t bring about centralization