Sitrep #038
Intern Strategy Success, Technical Performance & New Directions
Key Takeaways
- Technical Performance: The Bumper protocol operates efficiently, with strong mechanics, cheap premiums and excellent yield performance. Focus is on fine-tuning analytics and user-facing elements.
- Bumper Intern Strategy Success: Achieved a 52% increase in USD value and a 39% increase in wstETH amount, outperforming traditional holding strategies.
- Ongoing Issues: Challenges with Dune Analytics and minor UI/UX improvements are needed.
- Token Price Concerns: The BUMP token has faced stagnation. Listing on MEXC did not yield expected results.
- Adoption Challenges: Slower user adoption due to a bear market; strong educational initiatives are necessary to drive engagement.
- Marketing Strategy Overhaul: A new marketing lead is focusing on community engagement and influencer outreach in Arbitrum to boost visibility and adoption.
- Positive Outlook: The team remains optimistic about long-term success, emphasizing increased liquidity, token utility, and market awareness as key areas for growth.
In this Sitrep #038, we’ll cover the current technical performance of the Bumper protocol, the success of the Bumper Intern strategy, and the challenges we’re facing with token performance and market adoption. We remain optimistic about our path forward and appreciate your continued support.
Technical Performance
The Bumper protocol functions effectively from a technical standpoint, with its mechanics working as designed. The rebalancing mechanism is performing well, and yield and premium performance are excellent.
The current tech focus is on fine-tuning analytics and enhancing user-facing elements while the protocol continues to operate effectively under real-world conditions.
Performance
Performance tests show promising results with the Bumper Intern strategy, which has been an overwhelming success.
This strategy involves a simple process of either renewing, closing, or claiming (and buying back in) every seven days.
It has led to significantly better performance than merely holding assets, demonstrating the effectiveness of Bumper’s protective mechanisms.
The latest position can be seen in the table below but, essentially, the Bumper Intern position has experienced over a 52% increase in USD value and about a 39% increase in wstETH amount, versus a wstETH HODL strategy that would have yielded a 9.6% increase in USD value with no change to the wstETH amount over the same period.
Bumper Intern’s Position:
Outstanding Issues
Despite the protocol’s successful performance, there have been some issues with monitoring and reporting tools, specifically with Dune Analytics, which has been slow to provide accurate and publicly accessible analytics.
This data is crucial for understanding liquidity provider yields and other performance metrics, but the team is actively working to resolve this issue.
While the protocol is functioning as intended, some minor UI/UX issues remain. Addressing these will improve the overall user experience and provide more information to ensure the product is intuitive and user-friendly.
Token Price
The Bumper token (BUMP) has faced price stagnation and an overall decrease for some time. This lack of growth is a concern for both the team and the community.
While the protocol itself is performing well, this success hasn’t translated into a corresponding rise in token value.
The listing of BUMP on MEXC did not yield the results the team hoped for, especially since MEXC is a well-regarded exchange that was supported by the Bumper community.
The failure of this listing may have been due to poor exchange support, listing parameters, market conditions, or a combination of these factors. This led to setbacks in token price growth and general liquidity.
The team has identified a lack of awareness and market attention as the primary issue affecting the token’s performance.
The protocol hasn’t penetrated key communities, particularly within Arbitrum One, as effectively as anticipated. Within the Arbitrum ecosystem, Bumper is relatively unknown, despite high potential user overlap.
After successfully receiving notification of an upcoming Arbitrum grant, we will collaborate with Arbitrum to integrate new features and enhance awareness within the Arbitrum community.
Protocol Traded Volume
Despite the challenges, there has been steady progress in total traded volume within the protocol. Total traded volume on Arbitrum is nearing $4 million, which indicates ongoing activity, although this is still insufficient to drive significant token price movement. If the community grows, users grow and then the traded volume will too.
Yields
While the token price itself hasn’t moved much, the yields for liquidity providers are quite competitive.
Liquidity providers are receiving average returns between 27% and 56% APY (depending on the market). This can be seen on the Market Data page of the dApp.
However, without more public and user-facing analytics (such as Dune Analytics), it is difficult to effectively convey these returns to potential new users.
MARKETING
Challenges in Adoption
Bumper launched during a difficult market period, leading to a more conservative attitude among users towards new projects and speculative tokens.
The bear market has also created hesitation in purchasing and using new tokens, especially for protocols requiring a learning curve, such as Bumper’s price hedging mechanisms.
Adoption has been slower than anticipated, as users are no longer in the “learning mode” they were during the DeFi boom.
During the DeFi bull run, users were eager to experiment with new protocols, but this curiosity has since diminished, leading to slower organic adoption. Overcoming this will require strong educational campaigns and user incentives.
Marketing Overhaul
The Bumper team recognizes the importance of rethinking its marketing strategy, which is currently a core focus.
A new marketing lead has been hired with a strong background in community-building and product success. They are already engaging with key influencers and communities, particularly in Arbitrum, to increase visibility and adoption of the token.
Their connections and strategies are expected to help Bumper gain more traction, especially since only one out of the 20 influencers they contacted in Arbitrum had heard of Bumper, indicating a significant gap in awareness.
Community Engagement and Incentives
To encourage greater participation and token use, the team is exploring “learn-to-earn” models and other incentive-based strategies.
These initiatives could reward users with BUMP tokens for engaging with educational content, interacting with the protocol, or promoting the token.
Such strategies have proven effective in other crypto projects for onboarding new users and spreading awareness.
Positive Outlook
Despite current challenges, the team remains optimistic about the protocol’s long-term success.
With a new marketing team and a renewed focus on community outreach, Bumper has the potential to grow significantly, especially as market conditions improve.
The key will be driving increased liquidity, token utility, and awareness within critical communities like Arbitrum and beyond.
As we continue to develop the Bumper protocol, we want to extend our heartfelt thanks to everyone who has tested our product.
Your engagement is crucial to our success, and we’re excited to introduce a new format for our office hours — a Discord event where you can connect with us in real-time. This informal setting will allow for open discussions, and it won’t be recorded, ensuring a relaxed atmosphere for sharing insights and asking questions.
In next week’s office hours, Gareth will be walking us through the Intern Bumper strategy, so if you want to gain an advantage in your hedging, make sure to join us!
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About Bumper
Bumper protects the value of your crypto using a radically innovative DeFi protocol. Set the price you want to protect and if the market crashes, your asset will never fall below that price. Importantly, if the market pumps, your asset rises too.
Stay Connected to Bumper:
Join our Discord — https://discord.gg/YyzRws4Ujd
Follow us on Twitter — https://www.twitter.com/bumperfinance
Visit our Website — https://bumper.fi
