Proposal: Boost CXD via buybacks, and eliminate token locking

CIP: [to be assigned]
Status: Discussion
Author(s): awinter
Discussions-to: Proposal: Boost CXD via buybacks, and eliminate token locking
Created: 05-20-2022
Quorum: 4% of vlCXD / 50% of voting vlCXD must be in favor of the proposal

–Simple Summary–
The current CXD boosting mechanism limits selling pressure by locking CXD, and thus removing their supply from the market. A superior approach would be to create CXD demand by establishing a weekly buyback program from the open market. That is what is being proposed.

–Abstract–
Deprecate the concept of time locks and vlCXD tokens. Make CXD the sole DAO governance tokens. Redirect the weekly payouts (via 3CRV and idxCVX) to buyback CXD from the open market. The constant buy pressure is akin to share buybacks - by purchasing those tokens from the open market it ensures constant token demand growing proportionally to the platform, it reduces the openly traded supply of CXD and thus increases the value of CXD tokens. It benefits all CXD token holders proportionally to their holdings, it requires no gas fees to claim, and it is not a taxable event to holders of CXD.

TBD: Should these repurchased tokens be burned, held offline within the DAO Protocol entity, held offline within the DAO Treasury entity or some combination of those three?

–Motivation–
The current boost-locking methodology has a number of serious flaws that will hinder CXD adoption.

Current flaws:

  • Time-locks. People are hesitant to do time locks. This will apply to an even greater extent for institutional adoption.
  • Gas fees. Claiming rewards requires gas fees, often making it impractical to claim rewards.
  • Tax inefficient. Claiming rewards is a taxable event.

Voting

–FOR:–
Short description of what a future voter will be voting for.

–AGAINST:–
Short description of what a future voter will be voting against.

–Copyright–
Copyright and related rights waived via CC0

3 Likes

It’s not a bad idea tbh if we get an example of what the weekly rewards amount to to buy back the CXD vs the amount of CXD being locked instead would be interesting

2 Likes
  1. Weekly buyback is a very good idea as it will have create a constant buy pressure

  2. Many people will be hesitant to lock CXD because of ongoing market sentiments and they will not be able to vote because of it. This will effectively reduce the voting in the DAO

  3. Gas fee to reclaim the rewards will reduce overall benefits for small CXD holders and will not look much attractive

  4. Either the reward mechanism should be stopped in favor of buyback, or, a combination of reward and buyback should be used. For example, direct 50% of reward to buyback CXD from open markets and burn it

2 Likes

@awinter thanks for putting this up

1 Like

Any thoughts on whether the tokens that are bought back should be: A) burned, B) held offline within the DAO Protocol entity, B) held offline within the DAO Treasury entity?

  • Burned: Permanently removes supply, but that’s also the down side in that it is permanent.
  • Held by DAO Protocol entity: Available to a vote by token holders to spend on future initiatives, but not removed from the market. Could always be burnt later.
  • Held by DAO Treasury entity: Not sure why we would do this…just included for completeness.

Or some mix of these?

Looking at the dune stats, my math says about $49k will be distributed next week (15% of the total rewards collected).

If that amount were used for buyback, that would purchase 1.76MM CXD tokens (at today’s price).

According to CoinGecko the daily trading volume of CXD tokens is 25.7k CXD. So…by instituting a buyback that alone would up the daily volume by 685x.

A buyback program would create very strong continuous upwards price pressure on CXD tokens.

2 Likes

Thanks for putting this together, curious to hear the DAO’s thoughts.

One thing I would like to suggest is that this sounds like it would become two separate proposals:

  1. Change the locked CXD/vlCXD mechanism.
  2. Utilize the harvested rewards for mechanics other than fee distribution.

I don’t believe one is necessary for the other. Having more pointed, specific proposals (multiple, if necessary) allows more granularity when voting. Less of an “all or nothing”.

I agree with all that - being more granular and hearing the DAO’s thoughts. I can make the revision to focus this proposal on harvested rewards utilization.

@anthony, how do we interleave the CXD/vlCXD proposal with the adoption of the DAO constitution since that concept is ingrained there? Should that discussion be in the constitution discussion, or should the constitution wait for the CXD/vlCXD as the governance token proposal, or should the constitution refer to the whatever governance token is decided in that proposal?

All - I have split this proposal into three separate ones. Let’s discuss (and refine) the three of them separately.

Proposal: Boost CXD via buybacks
Proposal: Make CXD the governance token of CortexDAO
Proposal: Early redemption of vlCXD