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# System prepended metadata

title: 'Forum at a Glance: March 17th - March 23th, 2022'
tags: [Forum at a Glance]

---

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tags: Forum at a Glance
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# Forum at a Glance: March 17th - March 23th, 2022

![](https://i.imgur.com/3ZnETbm.png)

Welcome to the one-stop shop for a TL;DR on everything discussed on the MakerDAO forum.

*Links reflect my view of the most noteworthy activities in the governance, risk, and oracles categories. Disagree? Think something should be added? Leave a reply or send a PM.*

> A public PDF version of this post can be found [here.](https://pdfhost.io/v/Rnm72afEe_Forum_at_a_Glance__March_17_23_2022)

## Three-Point Summary

‘What is the most relevant information on the forums this week for MKR and Dai holders?’

- A16z team members [put together](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/a16z-makerdao-tokenomics-proposal-overview/14134) an epic four-part series outlining some intriguing suggestions for innovating MKR tokenomics.
- The MCD vault and governance tracker dashboards have been [updated](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/vaults-mcd-governance-trackers-transfer/14162) with some cool new features!
- Several informal [polls](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/informal-poll-actions-to-increase-competitiveness-of-eth-steth-collateral/14090) are underway to gauge interest in taking action to increase the competitiveness of ETH & stETH collateral.

---
## News and Announcements

**[A RWA DeFi ecosystem: more than just onboarding collateral](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/a-rwa-defi-ecosystem-more-than-just-onboarding-collateral/14079)**

@roollie from Centrifuge gave us an overview of the RWA Market on Aave after seeing many questions from the Maker community about it.

If you're unfamiliar, Aave allows for creating markets where people can borrow tokens by depositing collateral. Interest rates increase and decrease depending on market utilization.

The [RWA market](https://rwamarket.io/#/markets) launched on December 28th of last year and represented the first diversified real-world asset market on Aave. Initially, the market launched with seven pools and allowed liquidity providers to deposit USDC. Four of the pools are integrated Maker vaults. It currently has a market size of US\$19.1M, with 10.8M USDC deposited.

With this market, when a pool wants to increase its capital, issuers can deposit pool tokens in the Aave protocol and borrow directly from any RWA Market investor.

![](https://i.imgur.com/pt7Mktx.png)

This additional funding source provides stability and longevity, giving issuers peace of mind that "there are reliable sources of income across multiple fronts, similar to multiple banking relationships that a traditional company might have."

**[Maker Operational Manual - Updates!](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/aker-operational-manual-updates/14112)**

A new [Flowcharts](https://manual.makerdao.com/governance/flowcharts) section of the Maker Operational Manual covers Governance Flow, Urgent Governance Flow, and the Governance Process Selector. Thanks go to @LongForWisdom for creating these!

![](https://i.imgur.com/K7Op2up.png)

The [Spanish translation](https://manual.makerdao.com/v/mom-spanish/) is ongoing thanks to the continued efforts of the Ambassador Program in collaboration with the GovAlpha Core Unit.

**[Starknet simple bridge limit poll: Risk assessment & mitigation](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/starknet-simple-bridge-limit-poll-risk-assessment-mitigation/14158)**

This post gathers together the work done on analyzing potential risks associated with the Starknet simple bridge and exploring ways to address them.

**Risk Review and Mitigation**

-   The risks related to the simple bridge were summarized in a joint post by Bartek (PECU) and Maciek (Starknet Engineering CU): [Starknet DAI bridge and Starknet platform technical risk assessment](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/starknet-dai-bridge-and-starknet-platform-technical-risk-assessment/13950).
-   Each risk is broken down and assessed by severity and frequency of occurrence. Mitigating actions and processes have been implemented for each risk vector. A [spreadsheet](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1aByYNfjz1m7o9jyiIhHq-G6OEKq--wu0eoQXzVgc4XE/edit#gid=0) summarizes this work.

**Risk Parameter Proposals**

-   We propose a bridge limit—the maximum amount of DAI in the L1 bridge contract, and so the maximum amount that can be lost by users—of 5 million Dai.
-   The bridge launch will require completing all the mandatory items on the [checklist](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lg4LFQCW7x4bcR8gEgHoE7DB2rqa4GA4DPSUdMOgBsI/edit#gid=718243816).

**[Vaults (MCD) & Governance trackers transfer](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/vaults-mcd-governance-trackers-transfer/14162)**

The Data Insights Core Unit gave a short update about the vault and governance trackers, which have been transferred to new addresses.

beta.mcdstate.info is now available at [tracker-vaults.makerdao.network](https://tracker-vaults.makerdao.network/).

![](https://i.imgur.com/Dkuri8Y.png)

beta.mcdgov.info is available at [tracker-gov.makerdao.network](https://tracker-gov.makerdao.network/).

![](https://i.imgur.com/PriTpnP.png)

The new trackers are faster and have some nice new features, including:

* New vault charts
* End-of-day snapshot history for vaults
* Full protocol parameter history for governance

*Any feedback is appreciated as well as feature requests. You can reach the Data Insights team on Discord, #data-insights-public, and [here](https://data.makerdao.network/) at the bottom of the page.*

**[Flash Loan Debt Manipulation During Emergency Shutdown Vulnerability Postmortem](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/flash-loan-debt-manipulation-during-emergency-shutdown-vulnerability-postmortem/14036)**

@Kurt_Barry of the Protocol Engineering Core Unit submitted a detailed postmortem of the emergency shutdown vulnerability discovered July 2021 when DssFlash was [integrated](https://etherscan.io/tx/0x6d6928beab71c8ac2ec9a694caea67abf9fe6655ce09a37c4bc02a3a69894266) with the mainnet protocol deployment.

In short, the flash mint module, DssFlash, allows Dai flash loans to be taken out in newly minted Dai, which is repaid at the end of the transaction. During the execution of a flash loan, the outstanding debt of the system is correspondingly increased. This debt value is read and cached at a particular step of the Emergency Shutdown process. Because of the vulnerability, a malicious actor could have taken out a flash loan during the shutdown process and called this read-and-cache function in the same transaction, causing an anomalously high debt value to be recorded. This would have reduced the collateral disbursed per-DAI compared to the “correct” value. Since this devalues post-shutdown DAI, the attacker could have secured a profit by shorting Dai before executing the attack.

In the short term, this attack vector was mitigated by [deploying](https://etherscan.io/tx/0x852cc2db9a37d7bcde56bd201324e79a9f00c8f4216bac11f844638db093c241) a module that allows DssFlash to be permissionlessly disabled after an emergency shutdown. In the near future, a mechanism for disabling flash mints after a shutdown that does not require extra Keeper intervention will be implemented.

Check out the full post for more details, including a timeline and lessons learned.

Additional information:
[Post-Shutdown Flash Loan Vulnerability - Announcement and Remediation Plan](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/post-shutdown-flash-loan-vulnerability-announcement-and-remediation-plan/13746)

**[Quick Comparison of stETH lending markets Maker vs. AAVE](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/quick-comparison-of-steth-lending-markets-maker-vs-aave/14010)**

![](https://i.imgur.com/iiYFlDH.png)

@lyt of the Strategic Finance Core Unit published a comparison of stETH lending markets on Maker and Aave. If you're not familiar, stETH is the token users receive for depositing ETH into Lido Finance's decentralized Ethereum 2.0 staking protocol.

Aave's stETH collateral has seen a big increase, leading to Maker's market share, defined as the total value of wstETH in Maker vaults vs. the total value of stETH/wstETH stored as collateral in Aave pools, dropping from 100% to 29%. However, when we look at stETH collateral backing stablecoin loans, this more "apples to apples comparison" yields more promising results. In @lyt's words, "Using this comparison, Maker market share is truly 77.6% by collateral value. By value of stablecoin loans drawn against stETH/wstETH collateral, Maker market share is 73.1%."

Could some of this liquidity be coaxed into leaving Aave for Maker? @lyt concludes that while $132M of stETH collateral on AAVE and $41M of stablecoin loans drawn against that stETH could potentially be moved over to Maker, the addressable market is not currently very substantial and probably not worth expending resources to target.

---
## [Active Discussions](https://forum.makerdao.com/latest)

**[A16z MakerDAO Tokenomics Proposal Overview](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/a16z-makerdao-tokenomics-proposal-overview/14134)**

Members of the A16z team, including Luca Pro, co-authored a four-part proposal titled "Suggestions for Community Discussion: Innovating MakerDAO’s Token Model."

In the initial overview post, the team explored the existing MKR tokenomics model and introduced its three-pronged approach to innovating it.

Under the existing model, Maker's profits are directed to filling a System Surplus Buffer. When the Buffer has a surplus, MKR tokens are permissionlessly bought back and burned to boost the price of the MKR token. 

As has been [pointed out](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/against-the-burn/13412) by several Maker contributors, the buy-and-burn model may not be optimal for achieving the community's broader long-term goals. With the aims of "maximizing value creation, creating new utility for the MKR token, adding an additional yield-bearing layer of financial resiliency, and increasing the durability and efficiency of governance processes," the team has put forward three proposals for discussion, each with its own separate post.

### The following posts were submitted as a three-part thread, which has a separate [overview](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/a16z-makerdao-tokenomics-proposal-overview/14134) available summarizing all three proposals:

**[A16z MakerDAO Tokenomics Proposal One: Adding Utility Functionality to the MKR Token](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/a16z-makerdao-tokenomics-proposal-one-adding-utility-functionality-to-the-mkr-token/14135)**

This proposal, split into three sub-proposals, focuses on increasing the utility of the MKR token.

**Sub-proposal 1**: Require MKR as additional on-chain collateral for any RWA-based or structured vaults involving less transparent off-chain liquidation mechanisms, ideally as a first-loss capital. This MKR can also be combined with other external assets like ETH as an on-chain collateral package. This requirement would be *in addition* to the normal RWA collateral structure.

This change could help improve the alignment of the borrower and serve as an additional margin of safety.

**Sub-proposal 2**: Create a Secondary Surplus Buffer to serve as an additional layer of consumer protection (in line with the [Self Insurance Fund proposal](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/self-insurance-fund/10563)) that offers a yield distribution to those who voluntarily stake their MKR. Much like other major DeFi insurance pools, these tokens would be used to help backstop a potential shortfall event, in this case, one beyond that of the System Surplus Buffer.

**Sub-proposal 3**: Incentivize auction participants to stake MKR in collateral auctions, better aligning the interests of auction participants with the overall interests of the system.

The main idea is to offer a discount, applied as a rebate, to the collateral auctioned for participants who stake their MKR in the auction.

**[A16z MakerDAO Tokenomics Proposal Two: Aligning Governance Incentives](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/a16z-makerdao-tokenomics-proposal-two-aligning-governance-incentives/14137)**

This post, focused on aligning governance incentives across the Maker ecosystem, is also broken down into three sub-proposals.

**Sub-proposal 1**: Incentive Alignment: One idea to address incentive alignment among the MakerDAO workforce, MKR delegates, and MKR holders is to **reward both regular voters and official delegates with a vesting bonus denominated in MKR tokens** based on MakerDAO’s long-term performance and each contributor's cumulative activity.

**Sub-proposal 2**: Participation: There are various pros and cons to weigh regarding a possible Curve-inspired “veToken” model application to MakerDAO. There could be some benefits to **rewarding long-term participants with more voting power**; however, @NikKunkel and @monet-supply both raised [excellent counterpoints](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/signal-request-gbmkr-a-proposal-to-benefit-long-term-mkr-holders/12756/16) against implementation of the proposal as written.

**Sub-proposal 3**: Information and Expertise: One item that could be especially helpful to the community is a **new governance dashboard** that clearly shows the linear flow for proposals, provides links with details to discussions (the forum is like a maze even for experienced users, let alone new ones), and organizes topics in a way that any newcomer can easily understand.

**[A16z MakerDAO Tokenomics Proposal Three: Increasing Financial Resiliency and Fostering Growth](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/a16z-makerdao-tokenomics-proposal-three-increasing-financial-resiliency-and-fostering-growth/14138)**

The series concludes with the third and final proposal: Increasing the System Surplus Buffer to begin aligning it with calculated, vault-specific expected losses related to credit and liquidation risk as the primary insurance pool for MakerDAO.

To summarize the reasoning, "@krzkaczor elegantly [outlined](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/against-the-burn/13412) why MakerDAO should focus on aggressive growth with retained earnings: capital is hard to come by and should be used most efficiently to achieve more long-term earnings. Given the start-up nature of MakerDAO and its incredible potential, capital could be reinvested in ways to improve Maker's profitability and sustainability as it grows."

For now, the team suggests that MakerDAO could keep the Surplus Buffer at \$250M while the community decides on capital allocation routes and finalizes the metrics that determine its size.

**[Moderating “Suspicious” Accounts](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/moderating-suspicious-accounts/14173)**

This post gives us an overview of how GovAlpha engages in forum management in response to several inquiries about new accounts, suspected sock puppets, and forum moderation.

Generally, moderators prefer only to take action on posts that are "overtly against policies and expected behaviors." All forum members can flag posts, DMs, and public comments they feel warrant closer scrutiny by the moderators.

The post also provides a list of "community considerations"—questions for moderators to ask themselves and for forum users who favor a more active approach to moderation to consider:

-   Should accounts that attempt to obscure their speech patterns (using specific vernacular, "broken" English, or other formulaic tools) be treated with greater suspicion?
-   To what extent is it the moderator's job to "tone police" criticism in an effort to promote healthy dialogue?
-   Should anonymous/pseudonymous authors be treated the same as known members of the community?
-   What is the appropriate escalation of moderation? When should accounts be banned, if ever?
-   Who should have the power to moderate these discussions, and how should their work be evaluated?
-   Are there steps/procedures we can implement to limit spam and encourage more discussion on governance proposals?

The discussion has already begun, so feel free to throw your two cents in if you're interested in forum moderation and management.

**[[Informal poll] Actions to increase competitiveness of ETH & stETH collateral](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/informal-poll-actions-to-increase-competitiveness-of-eth-steth-collateral/14090)**

stETH, the token users receive for depositing ETH into Lido Finance's decentralized Ethereum 2.0 staking protocol, has been gaining in popularity as DeFi collateral. Maker, however, has seen stETH adoption slow down since late February. We learned in the [comparison post](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/quick-comparison-of-steth-lending-markets-maker-vs-aave/14010) between the Maker and Aave stETH markets, adoption on Aave has been rising rapidly.

This post offers informal polls regarding three different ways to increase MakerDAO's competitive advantage in this area:

**1. Shall we add a stETH vault-type with a lower liquidation ratio?**

*Pros*
* Allows users to increase their exposure to stETH
* Higher stability fee can be requested for this

*Cons*
* Could see the usage of ETH-B moving to this new vault-type, which could increase the risk to Maker protocol
* Increases risk to Maker protocol in case of lost peg between stETH and ETH

**2. Shall we add a stETH vault-type with a *higher* liquidation ratio?**

*Pros*
-   Allow users to get cheaper liquidity with their stETH, attracting more risk-averse users
-   Can increase the total amount of stETH collateral in the Maker protocol
-   ETH-C users might switch, which could net more SF revenue if SF for this vault type is higher

*Cons*
-   stETH-A users might switch, which could net less SF revenue if SF for this vault-type is lower
    -   Increases risk to Maker protocol in case of lost peg between stETH & ETH

**3. Shall we request core units to investigate aETH as collateral in Maker?**

*Pros*
-   Allows users to go long on the supply-side interest rate for ETH on Aave
-   Adds downward pressure on the interest rate on Aave for ETH, making borrowing DAI with ETH on Maker more attractive

*Cons*
-   The downward pressure on the ETH interest rate on Aave might make stETH on Aave even more attractive

The informal polls will run until March 28, 2022.

------
## [Seeking Consensus](https://forum.makerdao.com/tag/active-signal)

‘Yo, do you even signal?’

There's only one active signal request right now? I don't believe it!

**[[Signal Request] Onboard PAXG](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/signal-request-onboard-paxg/13768)**

Sebastien from the Strategic Finance Core Unit revisits the topic and attempts to push PAXG to be onboarded. 

All risk assesments have been submitted during 2020:
- [[PAXG] ERC20 Token Smart Contract Domain Community Assessment](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/paxg-erc20-token-smart-contract-domain-community-assessment/3443)
- [[PAXG] Collateral Onboarding Oracle Assessment (MIP10c3-SP16)](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/paxg-collateral-onboarding-oracle-assessment-mip10c3-sp16/5376)
- [[PAXG] Collateral Onboarding Risk Evaluation](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/paxg-collateral-onboarding-risk-evaluation/4833)

Additionally, PAXG was [previously approved](https://vote.makerdao.com/polling/QmYwY5gP) for onboarding through a governance poll.

Today, both market cap and liquidity for PAXG have significantly increased, and the Uni V2 poll, although small, is handling 2M of hourly volume and 50M daily.

Parameters proposed for PAXG are a Debt Ceiling of 5M, Liquidation Ratio of 125% (which may be instead set to 130%), and a Stability Fee of 4% that may also be altered based on current situations. 

Sebastien provides the pros and cons of onboarding PAXG and concludes the signal request by asking the community whether they want to onboard PAXG as a collateral type in Maker's MCD?

**Vote will run until April 5, 2022.**

Here are the current voting results:
![](https://i.imgur.com/xa0sqpN.png)

-----
## [Ongoing Initiatives](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/governance-initiatives/1347)

‘Oh my god, this is taking ages; why can’t things be simple?’

[Maker Operational Manual](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/announcing-maker-operational-manual/12553) - @GovAlpha-Core-Unit release the launch of the Maker Operational Manual and invite all members and Core Units to reach out if they wish to provide any help or documentation to add for the Manual.

[Recognised Delegate Requirements](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/recognised-delegate-requirements/9421) - @LongForWisdom writes a detailed overview of the current requirements and application system to become a delegate in the Maker community. Check out this [thread](https://forum.makerdao.com/search?expanded=true&q=%40LongForWisdom%20%23governance%3Adelegates) for more posts related to delegation.

[Where to Find Opportunities at MakerDAO](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/where-to-find-opportunities-at-makerdao/10076/2) and [Open positions at MakerDAO](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/open-positions-at-makerdao/12197) - Looking for job opportunities at MakerDAO? Perfect! @Davidutro and @manomad set up individual threads containing resources to help find available job listing and hiring practices. *If anybody has additional information on unique hiring practices or job listings, please comment on the thread.*

[:mega: Collateral Calls - Calling all Projects!](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/collateral-calls-calling-all-projects/3715) - @juan sets up a signup thread for projects wishing to present on the bi-weekly collateral call. Know any potential collateral partners that want to present? Refer them here.

[Collateral Status Index](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/collateral-status-index/2231) - Confused about the current status of the various collateral types discussed recently? Check out this post to determine the status and current position within the onboarding process.

[Weekly MIPs Updates](https://forum.makerdao.com/tag/mips-update) - @blimpa brings the latest updates in the world of MIPs.

[The Official Welcome Thread](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/the-official-welcome-thread/771/4) - A welcome and introductions thread. Not strictly governance, but if anyone new or old wants to introduce themselves, now is your chance!

-----
## [Help Wanted](https://forum.makerdao.com/c/miscellaneous/help-wanted/11)

‘Oh %#$?, we need a doodad, and we need it now.’

[Wanted: Governance Contributors for GovAlpha](https://forum.makerdao.com/t/help-wanted-govalpha/8811) - @LongForWisdom puts out the call for new team members! Different tracks are available depending on interest and time commitment.

We could always use help reviewing [MIPs in the Request for Comment phase](https://forum.makerdao.com/tag/rfc).

## [Feedback Survey](https://survey.sogosurvey.com/r/qTb1p7)

*Please, check out the [Forum at a Glance feedback survey](https://survey.sogosurvey.com/r/qTb1p7) to help us improve and scale these reviews - It will be fun, I promise.* 

Credit:
@nothsa
@Artem_Gordon
