Could you provide the KPI(s) that you deem relevant for your protocol, both in absolute terms and relative change, for the first of each month starting from October 2023 until April 2024, including the extremes? If you don’t know what KPI might be relevant for you or how to properly define them, please refer to the following document: [Arbitrum DAO] OpenBlock Labs Incentive Onboarding Spec
TVL of vaults
We believe the ROI for Arbitrum is among the highest for Solv. 150k in STIP grants translating to over USD 100mm in TVL gain.
[Optional] Any lessons learned from the previous STIP round?
We would actually like to better track where the users came from, whether the funds were from Arbitrum or bridged over. In addition, we just launched out Solv point system and keen to see how this works together with the broader extended incentive program.
New Plans for STIP Bridge
How much are you requesting for this STIP Bridge proposal?
150,000 ARB
Do you plan to use the incentives in the same way* as highlighted in Section 3 of the STIP proposal?
We plan to update the incentive program.
[Only if answered “no” to the previous question] How will the incentive distribution change in term of mechanisms and products?
We would like to split the distribution into 2 parts:
50% for invesments into existing Solv vaults on Arbitrum (including SolvBTC). This part basically remains the same as STIP.
50% to incentivize the creation of a SolvBTC liquidity pool. SolvBTC is a yield bearing BTC, a new offering that we just launched and are keen to create liquidity on Abitrum for.
10.Could you provide the addresses involved in the STIP Bridge initiative (multisig to receive funds, contracts for distribution, and any other relevant contract involved), and highlight if they changed compared to the previous STIP proposal?
The address will be:
Multisig to receive the incentives: 0x04dd7cF38a249a371a8e589bC1C44485BC791d3F
Contracts that will distribute the incentives: new contract in developing
The multisig used to receive the incentives will be the same, while the incentive distribution contract changed compared to STIP
Could you share any feedback or suggestion on what could be improved in future incentive programs, what were the pain points and what was your general evaluation of the experience?
We applied the STIP in Sep 2023, and received the distribution only in Feb 2024. The delay in the entire process was not great from a planning perspective. Solv was lucky that we had tremendous growth during this period, but would have appreciated a more timely process.
Just finished by the Openblock team and added in the post too.
You distributed incentives through 3 Epochs, from Mar 5th, 2024 to March 29th, 2024?
→ Yes. We have received the grants in February 2024. The rewards cover all investments on Solv Arbitrum from January 1st to March 29th, 2024(12 weeks), and we have distributed them in 3 epochs as above.
It would be great to see a bit closer how incentives impacted metrics within this small period of time
→ Even though the distribution occurred over a short period of time, our users were aware of us getting the STIP since the votes passed(Snapshot , Otc. 16th, 2023). As such, purely looking at the metrics over the distributed period is probably not accurate. Looking over the entire period is probably a better measure of the success and impact of STIP had on Solv.
Also please describe how you achieved the strong growth prior to the incentives, along with how the 150k ARB was distributed in just 3 weeks - was this done retroactively for previous depositors, etc. ? (I know this is explained in the Final Recap, but it would be great to have a quick high level view in the Addendum too)
How you went about this part of the STIP will likely be where delegates point their magnifying glass, so to speak.
→ the 150k ARB was retroactively distributed to prior depositors to ensure that early users were also rewarded for their support. A good portion of the growth can be attributed to 1) engaging various communities within the Arbitrum ecosystem and 2) BD-ing communities outside the ecosystem to bring fresh funds into Arbitrum
Please think about the lessons you learned during the STIP that led you to come up with the future goals you have listed (user monitoring, point system)
→ The previous STIP rewards were mostly manually in statistics and distributed to the users. We’d have developed a smart contract fits our products for the future distribution, in a manner of better user monitoring and distribution efficiency)
Can you give more insight into the success of each individual strategy from the STIP?
Offchain/RWA funds
→ RWA funds required KYC and given the uptick in the market, we decided to have less of a focus on this given the timing of the cycle. We put up an addendum for our initial proposal to exclude this portion from getting STIP rewards
Onchain Delta Neutral Strategy funds
→ We spent most of our time growing users here because this is where we believe resonated best with users. It also helped that the strategy returns were very successful and helped draw significant new funds and users
What did you learn and why are you changing the distribution?
→ We are changing the distribution because of a new product we launched. SolvBTC - a yield bearing BTC. We want to incentivize users to further explore this new offering with us and keen to get additional feedback from users.
Please expand on your feedback - did you have KYC issues? Why did these issues arise?
→ We had KYC issues, some team members took a significantly longer time to clear the KYC. Also it was between the New Year and CNY holidays, which dragged the process even more.
Your TVL has been falling post-incentives - can you comment on this at all?
→ We can attribute this to 2 reasons. 1) Strong competition from other chains, especially incentives or point system that attracted a significant number of users or TVL. 2) The launch of our new product - SolvBTC, that we saw some users and funds flowing into this. We want to greatly incentivize a stronger uptake of this on Arbitrum, which is why we are splitting a portion of the incentives.
Can you add context to the spikes in DAU and transactions visible in your Dune dashboard? Were these linked to specific events?
Each time when users were joining a new fund activated, it would cause a spike on the dashboard. And since the redemption takes a short period of time, users on Solv don’t need to frequently interact with our products.
On behalf of the Arbitrum community members who delegated their voting power to us, we’re voting For this proposal.
Solv Protocol achieved very impressive growth during the initial STIP phase, with TVL increasing from $3.3M in October 2023 to $107.5M by April 2024, a gain of over 3,100%. While attributing all of this $100M+ TVL increase to the 150K ARB in incentives is likely an oversimplification, the metrics do suggest Solv effectively leveraged the program to drive adoption and capital inflows to Arbitrum.
For the STIP bridge, Solv is requesting the same reasonable 150K ARB amount and thoughtfully splitting it 50/50 between their proven vault strategy and supporting liquidity for the new SolvBTC yield-bearing BTC asset. This balanced approach of continuing what worked while also supporting new initiatives makes sense.
We also appreciate Solv’s constructive feedback around better tracking user origins and compressing the timeline from application to fund distribution in the future. This shows active engagement with the program and a desire to help optimize it.
Given Solv’s strong STIP performance and detailed go-forward plans, we believe renewing their funding at the same level is an easy decision to continue supporting a growing protocol that has demonstrated an ability to bring new users and liquidity to the Arbitrum ecosystem.
Reasoning: The incentive seemed to work well and it makes sense to continue funding for them to grow the protocol with an additional change to a new BTC related offering.
We voted yes on funding this due to Solv Protocol’s impressive ability to significantly increase TVL with efficient use of incentives. Their performance in the previous STIP, achieving substantial TVL from a 150,000 ARB grant, demonstrates a high return on investment for the Arbitrum ecosystem. Additionally, their new incentive plan to support both existing vaults and the creation of a SolvBTC liquidity pool is smart and combines a tried and true method with new experiments, we are in favor.
Solv Protocol smashed their STIP KPIs so it’s only reasonable to trust them to continue along this positive track. Also looking forward to seeing how the Solv point system works.
As we consider performance per metrics, we see that with the comparatively small amount of grants the protocol has given clearly successful output. While the requested amount remains unchanged, we are eager to see future results from the protocol and will vote in favor.
The UADP decided to Abstain on this automatic challenge Snapshot since the protocol submitted their application late–this is simply a matter of following proper procedure and does not take into consideration the contents of the STIP Bridge Challenge itself.
Many thanks to the support and feedbacks from all of you who are representing a strong Arbitrum community!
Solv will be proudly to continue the building on Arbitrum and confident with all the support of the community!
