Octover 10, 2023: $crvUSD on the Ballot 🗳️✅

Aave and Arbitrum consider proposals to help expand $crvUSD

Vote early, vote often!

The wacky world of DAO governance may be occasionally preposterous, but DeFi always charts its way through the muddy waters.

A series of DAO votes are winding their way through governance, all of which affect the future direction of Curve’s $crvUSD stablecoin.

AAVE

An upcoming vote on Aave could see $crvUSD onboarded onto Aave.

Boomers may recall the fraught history of Mich’s $CRV lending on Aave and the heat it attracted from jealous microbrains. Anybody hoping for a repeat of such drama will likely be disappointed, as the parameters around $crvUSD would be tighter, and it’s less likely to be OTC’ed at $0.40.

The $crvUSD onboarding would include the stablecoin as borrowable but not serve as collateral.

The supply and borrow cap are set in the mid eight figures, about half of $crvUSD’s ever-expanding supply.

The initial replies to the proposal are positive, so we imagine [hope] the thread proves uncontroversial.

Don’t expect this to land anytime soon though. The temperature check represents the first step in a long and deliberative process.

Arbitrum STIP

On Arbitrum, home of so many DeFi powerhouses, a highly public vote is taking place on distributions of several $ARB tokens.

The STIP votes have been far more of a free-for-all, with so many DeFi protocols deployed to the chain. 0xDaesu provides a visualization of the current status just a few days before deadline:

The process of voting on so many protocols will inevitably invite some amount of second-guessing about the process.

For a level-headed debate about these nuances, check last week’s Leviathan roundtable discussion, as well as several streams since:

While a swath of Arbitrum-native protocols have since crossed the finish line, a number of DeFi blue chips are struggling their way over the finish line.

One can certainly see both sides of the argument here. For protocols that have established Arbitrum as their home turf, one can understand the protective mindset that might prefer to see outside giants from establishing a toehold on their playing field. All the same, a neutral observer looking to promote the success of Arbitrum as a protocol would likely agree the L2 would only stand to benefit from the presence of the majors.

For its part, the vote on Curve is a bit less contentious, but still very far short of quorum (70MM). If you happen to be an $ARB whale, go vote!

The actual proposal was authored by the inestimable WormholeOracle, after which a spirited discussion ensued. The reaction in the forum was mostly positive, with some questions around the emphasis on $crvUSD and idle $ARB from prior grants.

Should the proposal not reach quorum, it’s not necessarily the end of the line.