This is MMP2019, a rather recent active IOTA community member albeit a long-time supporter of the tech since 2017. I have thought long and hard on things I could give back to the IOTA community, which has grown to be my second family over the last couple of years. As a small business owner myself and now pursuing a career in VC/Angel investment, I’d like to share my insight that could shed some lights on my personal investment journey into IOTA ecosystem. One important reminder is that I am not a programmer. Therefore, my analysis will be limited in that regards.
Today, I’ll be analyzing the most recently published TangleSwap documentation. This article is the first of many series to come. If you like what you read, please follow me here OR on twitter @ MMP2019.
PS: Not a writer nor is English my native language. In fact, I hate writing since high school yet here I am. Interestingly enough, I should have paid more attention in class on English literature. :)
The recently released TangleSwap documentation is concise, straightforward and self-explanatory. From its Vision, Team Introduction (very solid team, imho), Products & Services, Fee & Security, and Tokenomic; they are on point. Leveraging IOTA tech (Gas free & MEV free) is the main Unique Selling Point to attract traders, liquidity providers and other stakeholders. WTF is MEV (Miner or Maximal Extractable Value)? Please refer to this article.
It remains to be seen though if it is enough to attract users from other ecosystems. Regardless, this is still huge and unique in the space as the protocol covers its users’ gas fee through its operational cost. Let’s go through the most important bits and I’ll offer my opinion on each point.
- Vision: The team demonstrates clear vision of the platform’s functionality by providing an example of how a typical user would use the platform. Although V1 has some great innovations including: Trading Discount, Token Burn Mechanism, NFT Staking and Supernova Vaults (Not sure how this would work, but more details are to be released Soon™), I am more excited with the V2 features that include: Protocol-owned liquidity, Lend/Borrow Functionality, Stablecoin Launch & Backing, Concentrated Liquidity (Mitigate the risk of Impermanent Loss “IL”, refer to Uniswap V3 whitepaper), etc. Keep in mind that TangleSwap V1 is adapting the smart contract logic of Uniswap V2 and Pancakeswap (which allows Liquidity Providers to farm their LP token to offset some of the IL), and is written completely from scratch in native Go language for IOTA Smart Contracts (Another advantage when it comes to launch on Shimmer Network, upgrade on IOTA Mainnet & Assembly, security & audit). I am not an expert in this field although it’s the logic I derive from it.
- Team: Very credible and competent with lots of experience in Tradfi, Computer Science, Security & Audit, and Crypto Space. With my personal interaction I have had so far with Pilot Sevane, I find him genuine and capable of leading the project and the team. I have not spoken with other members on a personal level though. You can check out Moonaco Podcast for more details of the story here.
- Product and Service: Nothing particularly unique at this stage yet in terms of innovations relatively to other projects in the Cryptosphere albeit with a few innovations described above and with the leverage of IOTA tech. However, the team is constantly looking to innovate which tells me that they understand the space and its trend well. The team’s priority is to ensure that the V1 platform is secure and stable for now.
- Fee and Security: Fixed and competitive fee could be very appealing to traders. It also enables Bot Tradings & HFTs (High Frequency Tradings). The team seems to put security at the forefront of what they are doing, which is very reassuring with open source code and emphasis on working with one of the reputable external audit firm introduced by IOTA foundation.
- Tokenomic:
- Total supply: 100 Million tokens
- Initial liquidity: 3 Million tokens
- Vesting (Investors): 2 months cliff, then 10% every month
- Vesting (Team): 4 months cliff, then 10% every month
- Reserving 5% for community airdrop and more than 70% for Farm/Stake Rewards is fair and generous. With token burn mechanism (Tokenomic v1.5 will be released Soon™), it is reassuring us that the team is focusing on the long-term incentive and therefore the sustainability of the protocol. Investors and core team members are vested for a period of time providing comfort for the community that their aligned incentives are intact. Plus, the early adopters will benefit a lot from early farming by providing liquidity when the platform is launched as the APYs tend to be high in the 3–5 figures during the early days, weeks and months.
- More importantly, community will receive $MASS on the assembly proportionally to the amount of $VOID they have on the shimmer network. We got two tokens for the price of one. Yesss!
- Besides financial incentives of holding $VOID, holders can participate in the governance of the protocol, get trading discounts, access to the launchpad & IFO of other projects listed on the DEX and many other perks.
Conclusion
In early stage investment (Pre-seed or Seed), horse is somewhat important but it is eventually the jockey we bet on because it is almost certain that at some points along the journey there will be changes & obstacles and we rely on the jockey to ride through the storm to the finished line. Therefore, Core team members play a vital role in my investment decision.
Two essential attributes we look in a founder: Integrity & Critical thinking skill. Vision is important; Execution is important; Recruitment is important. However, as a great independent thinker you will get those decisions right. A great thinker rarely goes after a bad market. Period! Choosing to build on IOTA layer 1 protocol already demonstrates that capability. He/She will also be an excellent problem solver. Of course, they will make mistakes along the way. But, the decision making framework that they use will eventually rectify/mitigate and de-risk all those mistakes. And I believe the team does possess them.
Disclaimer: Please, DYOR. This content is intended to be used and must be used for information purposes only. It’s very important to do your own analysis before making any investment based on your own personal circumstances. You should take independent financial advice from a professional in connection with, or independently research and verify any information that you find in this article and wish to rely upon, whether for the purpose of making an investment decision or otherwise.
Sources:
Documentation: https://docs.tangleswap.exchange/
UniSwap V3 whitepaper: https://medium.com/r/?url=https%3A%2F%2Funiswap.org%2Fwhitepaper-v3.pdf
MEV: https://ethereum.org/en/developers/docs/mev/
Website: https://tangleswap.exchange/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TangleSwapE
Discord: https://t.co/tCJygJGXK6
Blog: https://tangleswap.medium.com/
Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4rfxDGrVo9X1yBaHA9v6BW
Stay Safe!
