$DOWN Q2 Recap
The Bad News (and why it’s actually good news)
At this point, there’s no denying that we’re deep in the throes of a crypto-winter, and that for all of us who didn’t panic-sell our bags and seek greener pastures elsewhere, we’re all down pretty bad. ETH is down over 75% from it’s peak at the top of the bull in Nov. ’21, and BTC is down nearly as much from its all time highs achieved around the same time.
So how is any of this good news? Well for one, the first people to evacuate when things begin to look dicey are the tourists and the grifters whose only real interest in crypto in the first place was a quick profit (which they’ve likely lost in most cases.) Culling the herd benefits the ecosystem by removing the people that aren’t likely to provide any long-term benefit to the space. At the same time, it creates incredible buying opportunities for long-term minded investors with heaps of capital ready to enter the crypto ecosystem as soon as their coins of choice are available. But potentially the most important benefit of the bear market is that it creates a trial-by-fire which tests the resolve of teams building in the space at the same time as it significantly reduces the ‘white noise’ and shiny object syndrome that are prevalent when everything is green throughout the industry.
That brings us to how $DOWN is handling the bear market, how we aim to sustain and even thrive this crypto-winter, and why the timing with which $DOWN launched is very likely to become a blessing in disguise.
How $DOWN can benefit from the bear market-
Firstly, it’s important to note that the value of $DOWN isn’t purely speculative, nor is it claimed to be supported by assets that it doesn’t actually have any intrinsic link to. $DOWN is provably backed by a growing collection of NFT and ERC-20 assets; which, while likely to currently be of a lower value than they once were, but regardless of current USD value, are collectively owned by everyone hodl’ing $DOWN. Because of it’s unique design (and soon to be made easily visible thanks to an upcoming collaboration with ChainLink), $DOWN will always hold provable value regardless of market settlement or USD price.
Another benefit to $DOWN provided by the bear market is provenance. As a social token, and an experimental tokenomics format, holding an IDO seemed like it could be seen as a cashgrab; especially when considering that the token was placed on the open market just before the bear market really set in. We’re using a Balancer LBP (liquidity bootstrapping pool) to make a large quantity of the token available in a fair and transparent manner; with liquidity being provided by the core team primarily at present. The reason this is beneficial is that the on-chain history of $DOWN will forever prove that even through a brutal bear market, the core contributors to $DOWN never removed any liquidity or sold any tokens; despite having the option to have done so at any time.
As more of the ecosystem foundation gets put in place, the majority of the token supply will be set to vesting schedules, and its worth mentioning that my 15% reserve of the token is currently locked into a 2 year vesting contract via Coinvise, where the community will also have the opportunity to complete small tasks and earn $DOWN tokens.
Now that we’ve explored a variety of ways that launching into a crypto winter may actually make $DOWN a much more desirable asset in the long-term; let’s recap what we’ve actaully accomplished in our first few months of the token being live.
$DOWN may already be more durable than many established tokens
$DOWN was officially made available in early March, meaning that the close of Q2 was the first real milestone by which we can begin to measure progress. Here’s a quick summary of what we’ve accomplished so far [strictly protocol/utility improvements; without considering the addition of several assets to the underlying reserve].
- $DOWN deployed via Fractional with an initial supply of 10mm tokens. (1% inflation annually)
- Established a bridge to Polygon via Chainport.app
- Mapped to Optimism via the official Optimistic bridge network in preparation for further expansion
- Airdrop #1 distributed to early supporters and patrons of BruceTheGoose, with more airdrops coming in the near future
- LP incentives deployed via staking pools available on the GYSR protocol and on DODO.
- $DOWN the Block marketplace nearly ready for launch; expected to go live early in Q4
- Began discussions with KlimaDAO veterans which is likely to lead to an ongoing collaboration which will lead to $DOWN being a climate-positive project.
- Discussed collaboration with ChainLink, who seemed very interested in the goal of establishing the $DOWN token model as a new primitive for the social token sector
- Initialized opportunities to earn $DOWN through bounties and ‘quests’ on various platforms, including Coinvise, Crew3, Chainwhiz Marketplace, Dework, and others.
- Listed on Nomics
- Migrated the website to be included in the creator’s site at this link.
- Established $DOWN lending/borrowing via UniLend Finance (though it may be necessary to migrate once they’ve launched their upcoming protocol updates)
- Several miscellaneous value-addition strategies created to build up the DAO treasury and the token’s backing
- Approached by several centralized exchanges that are interested in listing $DOWN once it’s more established.
- Explored a number of options for additional incentives and visibility
What’s next for $DOWN?
From a 1000-foot view, the path forward for $DOWN has the potential to consistently be adding utility and value to the token for the next 2–3 years if everything goes according to plan; but Q3 and Q4 are likely to see rapid expansion of the $DOWN ecosystem, to include the following (and more that’s yet to be revealed):
- NFT bonds — Those who were disappointed that they weren’t provided an opportunity to accumulate $DOWN at a discount will soon have the chance to do exactly that, by buying NFTs which (depending on the chosen method(s) of deployment) will have $DOWN tokens locked into them for a pre-determined amount of time, or that will have allocated airdrops over varying time periods
- $DOWN the Block — A token-gated and curated NFT art marketplace for the $DOWN community. Primary sales will take place exclusively in $DOWN, and a portion of every sale will be recycled into community rewards pools.
- The $DOWN DAO — Treasury management, capital deployment, grants and more will be placed under the supervision of the $DOWN holding community; creating the opportunity for token-holders to communally decide on and utilize available resources to acquire NFTs and tokens to either flip for profit or to supply to the $DOWN vault to pump our bags.
- Grant applications — Many blockchain networks and platforms offer “ecosystem expansion” grants. Applications will be submitted on behalf of the $DOWN DAO on any network that offers these incentives and which the $DOWN DAO has voted to include in our multi-chain initiatives
- Chainlink oracle integrations — Aside from the obvious price-feed oracle, $DOWN holders will also gain exposure to automated, provably random “HODL to win” rewards, by using Chainlink’s VRF and keepers to select and distribute prizes to holder’s based on various TBD factors.
So much more is being planned or discussed; it’s best to just end this post here. Keep an eye out for more news here, as well as on Mirror and Publish0x.
As a closing thought; and while its certainly not financial advice: Amidst the market-wide bloodbath that we’ve endured in the past couple of months; $DOWN has actually been more resilient than both BTC and ETH.
About $DOWN:
$DOWN ($DOWN Vault token) is an experimental social-token model with the potential to establish a whole new paradigm for social and community tokens. The ERC-20 is effectively an NFT and token index; made possible by leveraging the composability of DeFi and smart-contract technologies. Deployed via Fractional, $DOWN tokens represent proportional ownership of an underlying NFT. What makes the token so unique is the fact that the underlying NFT is also a functioning multi-chain wallet, created via Emblem. While held in the token-issuance contract, nothing held in the vault can be modified, removed or transferred. It can receive deposits though, and among the assets already supplied to the vault, are 10% of the supply of $DOWN. We’re calling this concept “quantum compounding” and are the first project in the world (to our knowledge) to introduce the concept.
