AGD 2024 - Recent work updates

- January & February 2024

Overview

Aave Grants DAO (AGD) aims to empower Aave’s future growth by serving as today’s gateway for onchain contributors. This thread will provide periodic summaries of our work in the ecosystem.

This update introduces six new grantees, highlights the LFGHO hackathon prize winners, and provides updates from AGD including an upcoming Gitcoin round for Aave builders.

Grants Summary

The total numbers for the grants program’s spending are listed below, commencing mid-May of 2021 when the program began up until the end of February 2024.

  • Total Grant Applications Received: 2547
  • Total Applications Approved: 268
  • Acceptance Rate:
    • Written (Stage 1): 10%
    • Video Call (Stage 2): 65%
  • Total Amount Disbursed: $5,654,796
  • Complete Grant Payments: 88%
  • In-progress/Incomplete Grant Payments: 12%
  • Status of all grants:
    • Complete/Live - 53%
    • In-progress - 33%
    • Inactive/Sunset/Rugged - 13%
  • Amount and Quantity Approved by Category:
    • Category - $cumulative cost - number approved
    • Applications and Integrations - $2,899,866 - 123 grants
    • Code Audits - $110,000 - 4 grants
    • Committees & DAOs that Serve Aave’s Ecosystem - $703,780 - 20 grants
    • Community (Marketing and Educational) - $701,050 - 54 grants
    • Developer Tooling - $422,000 - 15 grants
    • Events / Hackathons / Sponsorships - $186,000 - 14 grants
    • Other - $294,900 - 12 grants
    • Protocol Development - $446,200 - 21 grants

Approved Grants

Throughout January and February 2024, we received 103 grant applications and sent out funds for six new grants. The six new grants spanned two of our eight standard grant categories and ranged between $2,000 and $20,000. Learn more about them and the impact we believe they will bring below.

  • Grant Name - $ total grant amount(payment type) - grant type
    • grant description - “grantee self-description”
    • use of funds
  • FTL Labs (developer of Gyroscope) - $20,000(full) - applications and integrations
    • FTL Labs is receiving a grant to develop Boosted elliptic concentrated liquidity pools (E-CLPs). E-CLPs are a novel liquidity pool type that enables the asymmetric concentration of liquidity by focalizing the trading of assets along the curve of an ellipse.
      Boosted E-CLPs will build Aave deposits and yield into a new flagship line of stable pools on Balancer. These pools will combine the capital efficiency of E-CLPs (asymmetric concentrated liquidity on Balancer) with the capital efficiency of rehypothecating Aave deposits.
    • funds will go primarily toward development and support costs with any surplus being spent on BD support for the developed pools
  • Woosh - $10,000(full) - applications and integrations
    • Woosh is a payments dApp that aims to onboard millions of users in Latin America by offering primarily GHO-based stablecoin payments for Mexican users.
    • funds will cover the time spent on integrating GHO payments and optional Aave yield for Woosh users.
  • Keybox.ai Smart Contract Monitor Analytics - $5,000(full) - developer tooling
    • Keybox.ai is building a comprehensive and user-friendly dashboard that provides real-time analytics and insights into Aave. Its target benefits are enhanced protocol security, increased operational transparency, improved decision-making, and assistance in adhering to the constantly evolving regulatory landscape.
    • funds will go toward developing the smart contract monitoring analytics dashboard, along with feedback collection/analysis, alert system development, and project management
  • react-aave-sdk - $5,000(full) - developer tooling
    • A new library that will dramatically reduce the time needed to create a react or react-native dapp on top of the Aave protocol. It will be a full-tested and type-safe suite of hooks, providers, and wrappers that will make the creation of a new Aave-based dapp as easy as importing the hooks you need in your components.
    • funds will pay for the development costs of the library allowing for easier and more creative integrations
  • MirrorTable - $2,000(full) - applications and integrations
    • LFGHO hackathon winners for the project Ghothique will further develop their onchain mirror tables concept, aiming to onboard startups raising angle rounds into the GHO ecosystem.
    • funds will go to building costs for the development team
  • GhoFund - $2,000(full) - applications and integrations
    • LFGHO hackathon winner GHOFund is a treasury management tool designed for DAOs, enabling them to connect their treasuries with DeFi opportunities and facilitate GHO streaming for DAO contributors.
    • funds will go to kickstarting further development of GhoFund

Events Summary

The anticipated LFGHO hackathon took place in January from the 12th - 24th. Over 800 hackers showed up resulting in 254 teams participating for the full two weeks of hacking. @AaveLabs spearheaded the planning efforts with ETH Global and did an incredible job supporting hackers (s/o especially to @spartan), leading top-tier workshops, and everything else that went into LFGHO being a success.

LFGHO was originally outlined and funded in AGD’s Jan 2023 proposal. In line with Aave Labs’ successful proposal and what we heard from the community during our most recent proposal, events and marketing for Aave are no longer within AGD’s scope.

Below is a list of the LFGHO bounty winners along with a link to what they built.

Payments:

  • 1st place - GHOShare - GhoShare is an iOS app created to address the specific shortcoming in current expense-splitting apps by enabling decentralized direct in-app settlements of payments using credit delegation, token swapping, and cross-network transactions, secured by biometric authentication and EIP 4337 smart accounts.
  • 2nd place - Tap - Send and receive payments fast and easy with GHO, gas-free, and with a great focus on User Experience

Vaults:

  • 1st place - Spectre Protocol - Spectre Protocol is a p2p platform for collateralized loans using NFTs. Another user can give you the supply needed to borrow GHO through AAVE :ghost: if you have no debt at the end of the loan, the supplier will receive the supply plus the APY earned in AAVE and a GHO reward!
  • 2nd place - GHO Yearn v3 Vault - A Yearn multi-strategy V3 vault that uses the ERC 4626 Standard to aggregate current yield sources available for GHO

Facilitators:

  • 1st place - Fragola - FRAGOLA is a framework to create cross-chain GHO facilitators, allowing for the secure minting/burning of GHO on Ethereum while depositing the collateral on a different chain.
  • 2nd place - Boo! The Facilitator - BOO! is an innovative Native Bitcoin GHO Facilitator, a trustless mechanism where BTC transactions verifying via its BTC LightClient(spv) and minting GHO on Ethereum, with user ETH addresses tagged in OP_RETURN parsed by a specialized contract.

Integration Prize: Exorcise Your GHO, GhoWoo, GHOst, ghooey, ghothique, GhoBox, Esprit, Boo, DeCredit Wallet, GHOAlert

Ongoing Updates

At the beginning of the year, @corbpage stepped down from AGD’s review committee. Corbin has been a dedicated and passionate core contributor since AGD’s inception in 2021. We’re thankful for his time helping to grow Aave and AGD.

AGD is teaming up with Gitcoin to host a grant funding round soon! The round will target supporting Aave builders and includes matching funding from Gitcoin. You can learn more about the upcoming event here.

Thanks for reading our January & February update and continuing to keep up with the new teams building on Aave.

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- March 2024

Overview

This update introduces three new grantees and shares more details about the upcoming ‘Aave & GHO Ecosystem Advancement QF Round’ commencing at the end of April.

Grants Summary

The total numbers for the grants program’s spending are listed below, starting mid-May of 2021 when the program began until the end of March 2024.

  • Total Grant Applications Received: 2583
  • Total Applications Approved: 274
  • Acceptance Rate:
    • Written (Stage 1): 11%
    • Video Call (Stage 2): 66%
  • Total Amount Disbursed: $5,654,796
  • Complete Grant Payments: 89%
  • In-progress/Incomplete Grant Payments: 11%
  • Status of all grants:
    • Complete/Live - 55%
    • In-progress - 32%
    • Inactive/Sunset/Rugged - 13%
  • Amount and Quantity Approved by Category:
  • Category - $cumulative cost - number approved
    • Applications and Integrations - $2,956,766 - 127 grants
    • Code Audits - $130,000 - 5 grants
    • Committees & DAOs that Serve Aave’s Ecosystem - $703,780 - 20 grants
    • Community (Marketing and Educational) - $701,050 - 54 grants
    • Developer Tooling - $427,000 - 17 grants
    • Events / Hackathons / Sponsorships - $186,000 - 14 grants
    • Other - $294,900 - 12 grants
    • Protocol Development - $446,200 - 21 grants

Approved Grants

This past March we received 35 grant applications and sent out funds for three new grants. The three new grants spanned two of our eight standard grant categories and ranged between $10,500 and $20,000. Learn more about what each grantee is building below.

  • Grant Name - $ total grant amount(payment type) - grant type
    • grant description
    • use of funds
  • Notional Finance - $20,000(full) - applications and integrations
    • Notional’s $GHO leveraged vault will increase demand and liquidity for $GHO by increasing $USDC deposits in the $GHO/$USDC/$USDT liquidity pool on Balancer / Aura.
      Users can earn leveraged returns by borrowing $USDC from Notional and depositing into the pool to harvest yield. Notional’s Leveraged GHO LP vault went live at the beginning of April and already has over $750k in deposits.
    • Use of funds: conducting risk assessment, deploying vaults to mainnet, and the ongoing gas costs related to harvesting + reinvesting vault incentives earned
  • Swaap - $20,000(full) - code audits
    • Swaap is building Swaap Earn, the next version of their DeFi supercharging product. Earn allocates idle capital to blue chip protocols such as Aave or LRTs, maximizing yields with better capital efficiency.
    • Use of funds: code audit of the Swaap Earn contracts
  • GhoShare - $10,500(full) - applications and integrations
    • GhoShare is an iOS app created to address the shortcoming in current expense-splitting apps by enabling decentralized direct in-app settlements of payments by leveraging GHO, credit delegation, token swapping, and cross-network transactions.
    • Use of funds: development costs of the redesigned iOS app along with the QA of smart contracts

Ongoing Updates

The ‘Aave & GHO Ecosystem Advancement QF Round’ will open for applications starting next week with donations being accepted for two weeks starting on May 14. We hope all Aave builders, contributors, and community members will take part!

The strategic funding round aims to provide funding to projects contributing to the growth, development, and enhancement of the Aave and GHO Ecosystems. The round includes a $50,000 match pool, funded evenly by us and Gitcoin.

Projects can apply to be included in the round starting on March 23. Applications will be open until May 7th. Anyone will then be able to donate between May 14 - 28 with the matching pool split accordingly between the projects that receive funding. Look out for more details and an official announcement from Gitcoin coming soon.

Thanks for reading our March update and keeping up with the new teams building on Aave.

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- April & May 2024

Overview

This update covers both April & May at Aave Grants. We introduce five new grantees driving value to GHO and an update on the Aave & GHO Ecosystem Advancement round we’re hosting with Gitcoin.

Grants Summary

The total numbers for the grants program’s spending are listed below, starting mid-May of 2021 when the program began until the end of May 2024.

  • Total Grant Applications Received: 2648
  • Total Applications Approved: 277
  • Acceptance Rate:
    • Written (Stage 1): 11%
    • Video Call (Stage 2): 66%
  • Total Amount Disbursed: $5,654,796
  • Complete Grant Payments: 90%
  • In-progress/Incomplete Grant Payments: 10%
  • Status of all grants:
    • Complete/Live - 52%
    • In-progress - 34%
    • Inactive/Sunset/Rugged - 14%
  • Amount and Quantity Approved by Category:
    • Category - $cumulative cost - number approved
    • Applications and Integrations - $2,996,766 - 130 grants
    • Code Audits - $130,000 - 5 grants
    • Committees & DAOs that Serve Aave’s Ecosystem - $703,780 - 20 grants
    • Community (Marketing and Educational) - $701,050 - 54 grants
    • Developer Tooling - $427,000 - 17 grants
    • Events / Hackathons / Sponsorships - $186,000 - 14 grants
    • Other - $299,900 - 13 grants
    • Protocol Development - $446,200 - 21 grants

Approved Grants

We received 74 grant applications this past two months and sent out funds for five new grants. The five new teams we’ve granted funds to are some of the highest quality we’ve worked with. We are excited about the contributions they have already made and are looking forward to seeing the long-term impact they will have on GHO and the Aave ecosystem.

All except for one of the teams are “application and integration” focused with grant amounts ranging between $5,000 and $20,000. To see what each grantee is building check out more details below.

  • Grant Name - $ total grant amount(payment type) - grant type
    • grant description
    • use of funds
  • Gearbox Protocol - $20,000(full) - applications and integrations
    • Gearbox, currently one of the largest non-dex venues for GHO liquidity, is receiving a grant to continue developing leveraging strategies for GHO in their passive pools leverage line. They expect this to facilitate at least $10 million worth of GHO transactions through Gearbox within the first 6 months post-integration.
    • funds will go to the past integration of the Gearbox’s passive lending pools and the upcoming integration of the GHO/USDC/USDT Balancer pool
  • Notional Finance - $20,000(full) - applications and integrations
    • Notional Finance is receiving a second grant after the launch of their highly successful fixed-rate GHO vault in April. This grant will go to their work on developing and launching the USDe/GHO vault, exposing GHO depositors to Ethena’s yields. Additionally, Notional has continued to expand their support for GHO including listing GHO for fixed-rate borrowing and lending and introducing their first leveraged GHO vault.
    • funds will go to conducting the risk assessment and selecting the initial parameter set for the two new leveraged GHO vaults
  • Mean Finance - $16,400(full) - applications and integrations
    • Balmy(fka Mean Finance) has released a dollar-cost averaging tool that allows users to set up recurring AAVE and GHO purchases simply. This grant is for funding their K3PR network LPs which allows them to offer gas-free deposits for AAVE and GHO
    • fund will go to funding K3PR LP’s key to facilitating Balmy’s DCAing abilities on Ethereum mainnet with reduced cost to users
  • Sturdy - $10,000(full) - application and integrations
    • “Sturdy will integrate an aggregator for Aave’s GHO stablecoin into the Sturdy subnet (SN10) on Bittensor. This will enable users to earn AI-optimized yields on GHO, powered by the Bittensor network and the Sturdy protocol.”
    • funds will go to integration and build-out costs of for Sturdy’s AI-optimized GHO yield aggregator
  • x23.ai - $5,000(full) - other
    • x23.ai is receiving a grant for their AI-powered updates tool which originated from summarising Aave forum content. Given x23.ai’s close connection to AGD, this application underwent an extra rigorous review by the entire Aave review committee as outlined in our terms of engagement.
    • funds will be used to continue improving coverage of Aave and x23.ai

Aave & GHO Advancement Round

Our Aave & GHO Ecosystem support quadratic Gitcoin round has closed for application with 13 accepted applications. Community funding is live now until June 17th. Check out what the teams are building, show your support, and share to help the community grow.

Ongoing Updates

The grants funded this past April & May are among the highest conviction grants we’ve ever approved. We’re looking forward to watching their impact on GHO and presence in the Aave ecosystem grow. We continue to work closely with grantees and other teams in the ecosystem to ensure each grant has the largest impact possible. We are always open to connecting with any teams interested in working with AGD and supporting our grantees.

Thanks for reading our April & May update and keeping up with Aave’s newest builders.

1 Like

Hi and thanks for the update.
I do have some questions.

  • Whats the $ amount to this percentage?

How can Sturdy integrate GHO into their subnet when there is no bridge between Bittensor and Ethereum and there is no GHO deployment/connection overall on that chain?

Also its very rare that someone who got a grant is being visible in the forum. For me personally its really hard to see where the money is flowing into. Im missing a list or spreadsheet to track down the projects and the money flows.
It surprises me that the DAO isn’t really showing interest here. As the amount of money being spend is very big.

Also I would rather like to see specific areas being targeted instead of waiting for applications.
We are at a stage where the DAO should say what it needs and Aavegrants should be looking for a suitable team to handle that topic.

1 Like

Great question! I’m one of the contributors at Sturdy.

Sturdy is a DeFi lending protocol on Ethereum. The isolated lending pairs that users will be borrowing GHO from will be on Ethereum, as will the aggregator that users lend to. The subnet’s role is to determine the aggregator’s allocation of assets among the different isolated lending pairs. The subnet will communicate with the aggregator on Ethereum via API3’s Airnode Platform. We’ll soon be releasing a dashboard where users can see this working in real-time.

In the meantime, you can read more about the Sturdy protocol here and the GHO integration here.

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Update from AGD - October 2024

This update post will serve as housekeeping related to the wind down of AGD: announce the final grants that were awarded and share a breakdown of the current treasury holdings.

June & July Grantees

While AGD’s wind down was underway, the update posts in this thread were paused. As such, several grants that had been awarded and paid out in June and July 2024 still need to be announced.

In case you missed it, updated details on all grants awarded since AGD’s inception can be found on our website.

  • The University of Tennessee’s McClain Torch Fund - $4,500(full) - applications and integrations

    • The University of Tennessee’s McClain Torch Fund is integrating Aave into their finance curriculum to help drive adoption and awareness. Students gain hands-on experience with DeFi and interacting with Aave V3, to deepen their understanding of the Aave protocol.
    • Funds will be used to allocate each of the 113 students with $40 to fund their own EOA and cover gas fees
  • The Aave and GHO Ecosystem Advancement Round by Gitcoin - $25,000(full) - committees & DAOs that serve Aave’s ecosystem

    • Hosted in May 2024, this grant round was ran on Gitcoin’s Grants Stack platform and targeted funding teams directly building with Aave and GHO. In total, the round brought in $39k through 20 donors and supported 13 innovative projects directly impacting Aave and GHO.
    • The full amount of the grant was paid in $OP and used as matching funds for the round. Gitcoin contributed an additional $25,000 making the total matching pool for the round $50,000.
  • Alignment Games by Butter - $95,000(full) - committees & DAOs that serve Aave’s ecosystem

    • Butter, who previously led the incentivized Aave delegate campaign in 2023, is introducing a novel approach to distributing ecosystem funding. Alignment Games are a collection of mechanisms for increasing alignment between participants in a decentralized network.
    • $20,000 will be used by Butter to develop Alignment Games, specifically Conditional Funding Markets (CFMs), and submit a proposal to the Aave DAO to deploy CFMs, including an overview of the mechanism, an implementation plan, and expected outcomes and metrics to measure success. The remaining $75,000 has been earmarked for incentives to push forward Alignment Games in the Aave ecosystem.
  • Spindl - $10,000(full) - applications and integrations

    • Spindl is helping to drive attention and growth to Aave and GHO projects. Through their on-chain network of wallet-based publishers (wallets, dApps, onchain social platforms), Spindl will work with Aave and GHO projects to run targeted growth campaigns based on users’ onchain behaviors. Spindl is currently able to target wallet addresses through Rainbow Wallet, Phaver, Quickswap, TheCryptoApp, and CollabLand. They’re also onboarding new projects to expand the potential reach and ability for Aave projects to target wallets wherever they appear on-chain.
    • Funds will be used to run initial campaigns to bring attention and grow grantees or other teams with opportunities impacting GHO or Aave.

Current AGD Treasury

As mentioned in the wind down post, please see below for a current standing of the AGD treasury:

Asset # of Tokens Held in Treasury or Allowance
DAI 478.61
GHO 321,768.10
USDC 6,738.05
USDT 7,281.89
SAFE 5,243.26
AAVE 2,275.81
OP 259,221.75
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