Don’t Be Stupid; Fund Gitcoin with Your Treasury
For the profit-motivated, this is the correct choice
Two days ago, Kevin Owocki, El Presidente of Gitcoin, submitted a YAM governance proposal to allocate 1% of the YAM treasury to the Gitcoin Grants pool.
Initially, the proposal seemed to be pretty close; it was 50–50 for a while. As time has passed however, it seems that YAM governors want to keep that 1% of the yUSD treasury for themselves. The vote currently stands at ~66%–33%.
No one can really blame YAM governors for not donating to charity; the DeFi world is about maximizing wealth and YAM is pretty early-stage to be donating to fund public goods. Except I totally blame YAM governors for being so dense as to not see the wider picture.
The formalization of the YAM protocol donating funds to the highly credible neutral Gitcoin Grants platform is a massively wealth-maximizing strategy that YAMs should take part in. Perhaps on paper the treasury will appear to losing 1% of value to Gitcoin, but what isn’t shown is the massive amount of free marketing and value alignment signaling that a treasury-governing protocol can get by donating the smallest fraction to Gitcoin.
Andre Cronje, creator of the Yearn protocol, understands this:
YAM governors are leaving clout on the table. The ability to publically align with Gitcoin grants is the most bullish thing for YAMs I can think of.
Here are some people and entities that have received funds from Gitcoin Grants:
- Bankless
- ETHHub
- DeFi Dad
- The Defiant
- Antiprosynthesis
- MetaCartel
- The Daily Gwei
- DeFi Prime
- Myself (although I am closing my grant next round)
and that's just the Media Grants
YAM Governors who voted to keep 1% of their treasury is like saying “we don’t need these guys, we can market YAMs ourself”. Donating 1% of the treasury to Gitcoin is getting free access to these individuals, and making a very public statement that YAMs aligns with the efforts of these individuals. As a natural consequence of alignment, these individuals are highly likely to be to shill YAMs too!
“YAMs = Good! It helps fund Ethereum! When YAM price goes up, Ethereum gets more funded! Buy YAMs!”
Not to mention the tech grants like EIP 1559, Austin Griffith, Tornado Cash, WalletConnect, client teams etc. that are crucial for the existence of the platforms that YAMs run on.
YAM governors voting no on funding Gitcoin is a pretty big middle finger to all these efforts IMO.
Anyways, in terms of governing, I personally have much more governing power in the Yearn system than I do the YAM system, so I guess YAM governors are going to let the Yearn governors take all the spoils as to the benefit of being the on-chain treasury protocol that is publically aligned with Ethereum.
Yearn Governors are formally voting-in their long-term commitments to Ethereum and the Ethereum ecosystem. YAM governors have not signaled this desire. So therefore, I am super bullish YFI and kinda bearish YAMs, because YAM governors don’t seem to get it.
Buy $YFI, its good for Ethereum!
