What is $wsOHM? Low gas fees/easy to obtain on AVAX

Published in

Sherpa Library

5 min readNov 25, 2021

You most likely have heard something about wsOHM especially after AVAX exploded due to lower gas fees. You also probably have some questions on what it is, or maybe how it works.

There is also a video summary at the end of the article.

What are the differences between OHM and wsOHM?

wsOHM is pretty similar to sOHM. However wsOHM has the ability to be moved across chains with more ease. Another aspect is that the value of wsOHM is tied to the rebase index of OHM itself. Practically nothing is different besides the packaging and how it is obtained.

wsOHM means “wrapped staked OHM”. Meaning that it can be transferred between different systems efficiently and cost-effectively.

An example of this would be to transfer your wsOHM from the AVAX network to the Ethereum network.

Note: Besides facilitating cross-chain transaction, wsOHM has other use cases such as acting as a collateral on Abracadabra.money

Should I buy wsOHM or OHM?

There are some tradeoffs at the moment so it depends on how much OHM you want. As of right now, wsOHM is cheaper to obtain in small amount than buying and staking the equivalent amount of OHM. Again, this could change any time depending on the purchase amount and the current slippage.

If you want to test what Olympus is about by investing less than a couple thousand give or take, wsOHM may be a better option for you. As fees in the AVAX network are pennies compared to the Ethereum network fees currently.

You can check out the amount of slippage by checking below the trade button on TraderJoesXYZ.

Once you start investing a larger amount than a few hundred, you may encounter slippage when buying wsOHM.

Slippage for wsOHM is mainly due to lower liquidity at the moment. Once wsOHM becomes more popular to trade liquidity should increase in turn decreasing the amount of slippage.

If you are considering a larger amount of OHM to stake, you have to take gas fees into consideration.

Gas fees are costs incurred when you perform a transaction on a blockchain. If it turns out that the gas fees are less than the estimated slippage, you may want to just buy OHM, and stake it yourself.

Do you still get rewards for wsOHM?

Yes, because the value of wsOHM is tied to the rebase index of OHM itself. The index will continue to go up.

The equation is: Current Index(Current Price of OHM)= Price of wsOHM

Can I see my rebases?

This step is not necessarily needed, because you still get the benefits of holding sOHM. But if you want to know here it is.

Once you obtain your wsOHM on AVAX. You have the option to bridge it to the Ethereum Mainnet. This does cost gas fees. Make sure you are using the correct contract address if you decide to.

Then you should be able to see your wsOHM listed in the Olympus App. You should see your wrapped balance which is located under the “Staked Balance”

How do I buy wsOHM?

This is how I obtained my wsOHM

If you are a CoinBase user, you can buy AVAX through the app, or straight in the Wallet. The fees for this are small, normally less than one dollar. The AVAX will need to be in the Wallet.

You may notice your AVAX is not in the wallet, go into the settings tab, click on “Avalanche C-Chain”. Once you are in your AVAX Wallet the token should show up.

Now you are ready to trade your AVAX for wsOHM. I personally used Trader Joe to do the trade. On the home page, you click the trade button. Scroll slightly down until you see the “Swap” option.

You want the AVAX to be transferred to wsOHM which is located in the drop-down tab. Once you have that selected you can swap the tokens.

If you look below the swap button, it will tell you the amount you will receive, the price impact, and the liquidity provider fee which is not much.

It is recommended that you do the math in order to make sure you are okay with the fees. I usually use CoinGecko: Wrapped Staked Olympus to look at the current price.

Double-check if you are okay with what you are going to receive with the price you are paying: You can do this by multiplying the amount you are receiving with the current price of the asset.

Once you swap to wsOHM, you should see it in your AVAX wallet.

Why is the amount of wsOHM is less than sOHM?

Remember, wsOHM is based off of the index and the current price of OHM. So when sOHM is converted into wsOHM it has to take this into consideration.

This is why the amounts of sOHM and wsOHM will be different for the same amount of investment. The both use uses different price points which are tied to the same thing.

If you want a video version of this check out the video that I made:

Become an Ohmie on Discord

Join the discussion on the Forum

Follow on Reddit

and visit Sherpa Library to learn everything about OlympusDAO.