SECTION 1: APPLICANT INFORMATION
Applicant Name
Christoph Richter - chris@mc2.fi
Project Name
MC² Finance
Project Description
A unified social trading portal including all primitives on Arbitrum.
Team Members and Roles
Chris: Tech
Marine: Operations
AJ: Product
Mark: Projects
All core team members are doxxed.
Project Links:
Web: www.mc2.fi
Competitions: alpha.mc2.fi
Cointelegraph whitelabel version: ct.mc2.fi
whitepaper: docs.mc2.fi/whitepaper
docs: docs.mc2.fi
Telegram: Contact @mcsquaredfi
discord: discord.mc2.fi
twitter: twitter.com/mcsquaredfi
Contact Information
Point of Contact @piffie
Point of Contact’s TG handle: @piffie
Twitter: @piffie
Email: chris@mc2.fi
Do you acknowledge that your team will be subject to a KYC requirement?: Yes
SECTION 2a: Team and Product Information
Team experience (Any relevant experience that may be useful in evaluating ability to ship, or execution with grant incentives. Please provide references knowledgeable about past work, where relevant. If you wish to do so privately, indicate that. [Optional, but recommended]):
****
Christoph RICHTER
Co-Founder and tech lead
Developer 20 + years | 2 acquisitions | Mentored: 300 founders
Marine POPOFF
Co-Founder & operations lead
VC Investor | Fundraising: $60m +1 IPO | EDU: MSC+MBA
What novelty or innovation does your product bring to Arbitrum?
Problem:
The current Arbitrum ecosystem, while rich and diverse, presents a fragmented landscape where discovering and executing effective trading strategies across different protocols is challenging. Traders and investors face difficulties in navigating through myriad protocols and websites to identify lucrative opportunities. Moreover, the lack of a platform for sharing and learning from community-driven insights hinders the ability to make informed decisions based on real-time data and successful strategies. This fragmentation leads to missed opportunities and a steep learning curve for new entrants, ultimately slowing down the ecosystem’s growth and user engagement.
Solution:
Our product introduces a unified social trading portal that leverages the technological foundation of MC² Finance, offering a novel solution to the problem of fragmentation in the Arbitrum ecosystem. By integrating analytics, social media insights, and account abstraction technology, our platform simplifies the discovery and execution of trading strategies across all Arbitrum protocols. This approach not only enhances strategy visibility but also fosters a community-driven environment where insights and successes are shared in real-time.
Innovation:
- Social Media Integration: Traders’ social media posts with specific tags are directly next to the trading strategies showcased on the portal. Creating a holistic view of each strategy, combining technical data with personal insights and discussions from the creators themselves.
- Proof-of-Trade System: We introduce a proof-of-trade system where all strategies are DeFi-based, transparent, and verifiable on the blockchain, with advanced analytics, including risk prediction and reputation scoring. This approach empowers our users to explore and adopt strategies with confidence, knowing they are backed by verifiable success metrics.
- Seamless Intent-based Strategy Execution: Our integration of account abstraction strategy wallets allows users to create and manage their strategies directly on the platform. This feature simplifies the trading process, making it intent-based, socially integrated, and analytics-driven. By leveraging technology verified by audited third parties, we ensure a secure and efficient execution model that caters to both novice and experienced traders.
Impact on Arbitrum:
Our product brings significant innovation to the Arbitrum ecosystem by addressing the challenges of fragmentation and discoverability. By providing a simplified platform for strategy discovery and execution, enhanced with social insights and advanced analytics, we aim to accelerate the ecosystem’s growth, attract new users, and deepen engagement among existing users. This solution not only benefits individual traders but also strengthens the overall Arbitrum ecosystem by showcasing the potential of its diverse protocols and fostering a vibrant, informed community.
Is your project composable with other projects on Arbitrum? If so, please explain:
Yes, our project is inherently designed for high composability with other projects on Arbitrum. Our unified social trading portal does not operate in isolation; instead, it serves as a nexus that aggregates, showcases, and facilitates the execution of trading strategies across the entire Arbitrum ecosystem. This composability is achieved through several key features:
- Integration with Existing Protocols: Our platform leverages the capabilities of existing DeFi protocols on Arbitrum, such as GMX, Aave, Pendle, Magpie, and PancakeSwap, among others. By pulling in data and enabling direct interaction with these protocols, we ensure that users can discover and execute strategies involving a wide variety of assets and financial instruments available within the ecosystem. We already have several partnerships with Arbitrum protocols in preparation, including them sponsoring further prizes for competitions.
- Strategy Sharing and Adoption: The platform enables users to share their successful trading strategies, which may involve multiple protocols, thereby encouraging cross-protocol interaction and liquidity flow. This not only enhances the visibility of individual protocols but also demonstrates the synergistic potential when these protocols are used in conjunction.
- Social Media and Community Insights: By integrating social media insights directly into the platform, we facilitate a deeper level of interaction between users of different protocols. This social layer encourages community-driven discovery and validation of strategies, further enhancing the composability between our platform and the broader Arbitrum ecosystem.
- Account Abstraction for Seamless Execution: The use of account abstraction technology allows for the creation and management of strategies that can span across multiple protocols seamlessly. This approach simplifies the user experience, making it easier for traders to engage with and benefit from the composability of the Arbitrum ecosystem.
Through these features, our project not only benefits from the composability with other projects on Arbitrum but also actively contributes to strengthening the ecosystem’s interconnectedness. By facilitating easy discovery, sharing, and execution of cross-protocol trading strategies, we aim to enhance the overall attractiveness and utility of the Arbitrum ecosystem for both new and existing users.
Do you have any comparable protocols within the Arbitrum ecosystem or other blockchains?
While some share similarities with aspects of our project, none focuses on a unified overview of the best strategies across protocols.
- DappRadar and Portal.Arbitrum.Foundation: These platforms focus on showcasing protocols rather than strategies. They provide valuable insights into the ecosystem’s landscape but do not offer the depth of strategy discovery, social integration, and execution capabilities that our platform does.
- Index Coop and ApeBond: These are examples of protocols that combine existing protocols into higher-level financial products. While they offer innovative investment opportunities (where we’d love to collaborate) they are not providing the richness of unlimited composability over protocols into strategies.
- CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko: These platforms are primarily focused on token metrics and market data. While they are invaluable resources for traders and investors, they do not facilitate the discovery of trading strategies.
- Zapper.xyz and Zerion: These platforms provide users with tools to manage their DeFi investments and explore investment opportunities. While they offer a degree of composability and integration with various protocols, they do not focus on the social trading aspect or the in-depth strategy analytics and execution that our platform emphasizes.
Our project stands out by combining the best features of discovery platforms, financial product aggregators, and portfolio management tools with a strong emphasis on social integration, community-driven insights, and seamless strategy execution. This unique combination aims to enhance the user experience within the Arbitrum ecosystem, making it easier for users to discover, share, and execute trading strategies with confidence, supported by a vibrant community of traders and investors.
How do you measure and think about retention internally? (metrics, target KPIs)
- Daily Active Users (DAU) and Monthly Active Users (MAU): These metrics give us a basic understanding of the platform’s usage frequency.
- Weekly active Strategies: how often are strategies adapted and improved - typically this metric is better measured in weekly statistics, as good strategies do not have to be adapted daily.
- Social Community Engagement: # of social interactions (likes, shares, posts) on our and other networks indicates the increased adaption rate
- Net Promoter Score (NPS): To understand user satisfaction and the likelihood of recommending our platform to others.
Do you agree to remove team-controlled wallets from all milestone metrics AND exclude team-controlled wallets from any incentives included in your plan: Yes
Did you utilize a grants consultant or other third party not named as a grantee to draft this proposal? If so, please disclose the details of that arrangement here, including conflicts of interest (Note: this does NOT disqualify an applicant):
No
SECTION 2b: PROTOCOL DETAILS
Provide details about the Arbitrum protocol requirements relevant to the grant. This information ensures that the applicant is aligned with the technical specifications and commitments of the grant.
Is the protocol native to Arbitrum?:
Yes, our project is native to Arbitrum in the sense that it is specifically designed to operate within and leverage the Arbitrum ecosystem. However, our platform does not require the deployment of our own smart contracts on the Arbitrum network. This is because our platform’s functionality is built upon integrating and interacting with existing, audited smart contracts and protocols that are already deployed on Arbitrum.
By relying on these pre-existing, thoroughly audited protocols, we ensure that our platform maintains high standards of security and reliability without the need for deploying additional smart contracts. This approach allows us to focus on providing a seamless user experience and innovative features, such as social trading integration and strategy analytics, while leveraging the robust infrastructure and diverse offerings available within the Arbitrum ecosystem.
On what other networks is the protocol deployed?:
Yes. Ethereum and BSC
What date did you deploy on Arbitrum mainnet?:
01.03.2024 - we run internal tests since 2 weeks and will enable it for users with our next competition (8.3.2024 - in partnership with Cointelegraph Markets Pro)
Do you have a native token?:
Planned for July 2024: docs.mc2.fi/whitepaper
Past Incentivization: What liquidity mining/incentive programs, if any, have you previously run? Please share results and dashboards, as applicable?
We launched our first Early Access DeFi competition together with cointelegraph 2 weeks ago - preliminary results are so far more than 900 on-chain strategies were created.
Current Incentivization: How are you currently incentivizing your protocol?
We offer joint prizes for taking part of the trading competitions.
Have you received a grant from the DAO, Foundation, or any Arbitrum ecosystem related program?
No
Protocol Performance:
Protocol Roadmap:
February:
- Launch of the first DeFi Competition together with Cointelegraph
- Setup as Swiss AG
March:
- Simplified trading via Account Abstraction
- Extend to 2 more primitives (beside of Spot)
- Social Feed integration
May:
- Advanced Strategy Analytics
- Token insights & Unified trading overall primitives
July:
- Integrated Strategy Mirroring
- Launch of our Token $MC2Fi
Audit History & Security Vendors:
Our platform prioritizes security by integrating with third-party smart contracts that have been thoroughly audited by reputable firms, significantly reducing our risk exposure.
For Example: ZeroDev, Biconomy, Li.fi
Additionally, an investor conducted their own technical due diligence (Tech DD) audit of our platform via Softstack. The results of this audit are confidential and cannot be shared publicly as per the investor’s request. This approach ensures we maintain high security standards while focusing on delivering innovative features to our users.
SECTION 3: GRANT INFORMATION
Detail the requested grant size, provide an overview of the budget breakdown, specify the funding and contract addresses, and describe any matching funds if relevant.
Requested Grant Size:
90.000 ARB
Justification for the size of the grant
The grant size is meticulously calibrated to kickstart and amplify the social attractiveness of sharing innovative trading strategies on our platform, serving as a key driver for ecosystem growth and engagement within Arbitrum. This strategic focus on prize money for competitions and gas fee rebates is not only reasonable but essential for the following reasons:
- Incentivizing High-Quality Strategy Sharing: The allocation of prize money is designed to attract and reward the creation of high-quality, innovative trading strategies. This incentive encourages users to not only participate but to also put forward their best ideas, fostering a competitive yet collaborative environment that enriches the ecosystem with diverse strategies.
- Lowering Barriers to Participation: By providing gas fee rebates, we address a significant barrier to entry for many users, especially those new to the DeFi space or with limited resources. This approach ensures broader participation across the community, enhancing the platform’s vibrancy and the variety of strategies shared.
- Promoting Arbitrum and Enhancing Ecosystem Vibrancy: The grant acts as a catalyst, enhancing the social dynamics around strategy sharing and discussions about Arbitrum. By incentivizing participation and engagement, we not only boost the platform’s activity but also contribute to raising Arbitrum’s profile as a leading ecosystem for innovative DeFi strategies.
Grant Matching:
Grants will be matched with our own token.
1.2M in $MC2Fi Token
Grant Breakdown:
The grant will primarily be utilized for trading incentives and prize money for competitions designed to showcase the best strategies across the Arbitrum ecosystem. Specifically, the allocation will be as follows:
- Trading Incentives: A portion of the grant will be allocated towards incentivizing trading activity on the portal, rewarding users for engagement, strategy sharing, and participation.
- Competition Prize Money: We will host regular competitions to encourage the development and sharing of innovative trading strategies within the Arbitrum ecosystem. Prize money from the grant will be awarded to the top performers, driving further interest and participation in the portal.
60.000 ARB as prize money for 6 tournaments (10.000 ARB each)
30.000 ARB for gas fee rebates (only for eligible participants)
Funding Address:
arb1:0x7E3A1d2D6C54c45a6915586381D4C075dc875384
Funding Address Characteristics:
SAFE 2/3 Multisig
Treasury Address:
arb1:0x7E3A1d2D6C54c45a6915586381D4C075dc875384
eth:0x4592e8cEE8Fa5A46Ed713F102b45Af8C2baE2A44
(The Company Behind - MC2Fi AG is a Swiss AG and also has Bank Accounts)
Contract Address:
arb1:0x7E3A1d2D6C54c45a6915586381D4C075dc875384
SECTION 4: GRANT OBJECTIVES, EXECUTION AND MILESTONES
Objectives:
[Clearly state the primary objectives of the grant and what you intend to achieve]
The primary objectives of the grant are to stimulate growth, innovation, and engagement within the Arbitrum ecosystem through the following key initiatives:
- Foster a Culture of Innovation: Encourage the creation, sharing, and execution of innovative trading strategies on our platform. By incentivizing high-quality strategy development, we aim to establish a vibrant community of traders and strategists who continuously push the boundaries of what’s possible within DeFi.
- Enhance User Engagement and Participation: Significantly increase user participation on the platform through trading competitions and gas fee rebates. These incentives are designed to lower barriers to entry, attract a diverse user base, and boost overall activity and transaction volume within the Arbitrum ecosystem.
- Promote Arbitrum as a Leading DeFi Ecosystem: Utilize the platform and its activities to highlight the capabilities, flexibility, and advantages of building and trading on Arbitrum. Through strategic marketing and community engagement, we aim to elevate Arbitrum’s profile among DeFi users and developers, driving broader adoption and recognition.
- Build a Collaborative and Knowledge-Sharing Community: Create an environment where users are encouraged to share insights, strategies, and success stories. This objective focuses on leveraging social features and integrations to foster a sense of community and collaboration, making our platform a hub for learning and innovation within Arbitrum.
Execution Strategy:
- Launching Trading Competitions:
- We will organize trading competitions with attractive prize money from us, ecosystem partners and the grant to incentivize the creation and sharing of innovative trading strategies. These competitions will be marketed across our social media channels and through partnerships with influencers within the DeFi space to maximize participation.
- Competitions will be structured to encourage strategies that demonstrate creativity, effectiveness, and the best use of Arbitrum’s features. This will not only drive engagement but also highlight the capabilities of the Arbitrum ecosystem.
- Implementing Gas Fee Rebates:
- To lower the barrier to entry and encourage active participation, we will offer gas fee rebates for users who engage with the platform, particularly those participating in the trading competitions.
- Social Media and Community Engagement:
- We will leverage our own KOL network and media partners to promote the competitions, share educational content, and highlight successful strategies and user stories. This approach aims to build a vibrant community around our platform and Arbitrum and create reach also outside of the current userbase.
- Integration of social features on the platform will allow users to easily share their strategies and insights, fostering a culture of collaboration and knowledge sharing.
- Feedback Loops and Continuous Improvement:
- The platform will be active also after the grant timeline, launching competitions through prizes sponsored by ecosystem protocols to continue showing the best arbitrum-based strategies.
- Partnerships and Collaborations:
- We will seek partnerships with other projects within the Arbitrum ecosystem to explore cross-promotional opportunities, shared competitions, and collaborative educational initiatives. These partnerships will enhance the visibility of Arbitrum’s diverse offerings and drive mutual growth.
What mechanisms within the incentive design will you implement to incentivize “stickiness” whether it be users, liquidity or some other targeted metric?
Building up social Reputation with your strategy, and our unique “proof-of-trade” system - where KOLs can share winning trades that have been verified to happen on-chain. Further increasing the trust with their userbase.
Specify the KPIs that will be used to measure success in achieving the grant objectives and designate a source of truth for governance to use to verify accuracy.
Strategy wallets taking part will be able to be tracked via NFT
- Weekly Active Wallets
- WAUs
Grant Timeline and Milestones:
Month 1:
- 10.000 ARB (2 tournaments)
- 15.000 ARB (Gas Fee Rebates)
Milestones:
- Active unique strategies (Active wallets): 3.000
- WAU: 10.000
Month 2:
- 10.000 ARB (2 tournaments)
- 15.000 ARB (Gas Fee Rebates)
Note: The gas fee rebates are accelerated, as we will have to see how fast they would be spent through the time. in every Milestone the exact amount of gas fee rebates will be communicated and tracked. Rebates will be handed out in the form of Mintable allocations. If a user does not mint it in time, the allocation will be returned to the pool.
Milestones:
- Active unique strategies (Active wallets): 6.000
- WAU: 20.000
Month 3:
- 10.000 ARB (2 tournaments)
Milestones:
- Active unique strategies (Active wallets): 9.000
- WAU: 30.000
How will receiving a grant enable you to foster growth or innovation within the Arbitrum ecosystem?
- Diversity: Higher prizes mean more attractiveness to users sharing their strategies - that in turn will show users how to get started with the diverse set of protocols on Arbitrum.
- Showcase: Funding will be utilized to enhance the platform’s capability to showcase innovative and effective trading strategies developed within the Arbitrum ecosystem. Through trading competitions with attractive prize pools, we can spotlight the most successful strategies, highlighting the creativity and ingenuity of the community. This not only serves to recognize and reward users’ efforts but also acts as a powerful tool for demonstrating the potential and flexibility of the Arbitrum ecosystem to a wider audience.
- Social Integration: Our upcoming social integrations are making it easier for users to share insights, strategies, and achievements with their networks. This social integration is crucial for building a supportive ecosystem where users can learn from each other, share successes, and collectively contribute to the growth of the Arbitrum ecosystem.
Do you accept the funding of your grant streamed linearly for the duration of your grant proposal, and that the multisig holds the power to halt your stream?
Yes
SECTION 5: Data and Reporting
Is your team prepared to comply with OBL’s data requirements for the entire life of the program and three months following and then handoff to the Arbitrum DAO? Are there any special requests/considerations that should be considered?
Yes
Does your team agree to provide bi-weekly program updates on the Arbitrum Forum thread that reference your OBL dashboard?
Yes
First Offense: *In the event that a project does not provide a bi-weekly update, they will be reminded by an involved party (council, advisor, or program manager). Upon this reminder, the project is given 72 hours to complete the requirement or their funding will be halted.
Second Offense: Discussion with an involved party (advisor, pm, council member) that will lead to understanding if funds should keep flowing or not.
Third Offense: Funding is halted permanently
Does your team agree to provide a final closeout report not later than two weeks from the ending date of your program?
Yes
Does your team acknowledge that failure to comply with any of the above requests can result in the halting of the program’s funding stream?:
Yes