Hello @Ertemann,
we really value transparency and understand you might require additional visibility on these points. Hoping to address your open points, see a more detailed breakdown below.
We have an internal cost breakdown estimating a total of 2.5 FTE equivalents for the core team (varying based on the peaks of work).
A dedicated team covering treasury, risk, and data will be set up for the dYdX ecosystem and led by an experienced Treasury Management Lead. This team will be dedicated to the design of the staking program and related selection process for onboarding validators, followed by its execution, day-to-day operations, and the needs of the dYdX engagement. Additionally, this team will take care of treasury management, financial planning and reporting activities. We expect one of our data analysts and strategy & operations engineers to support our Treasury Management Lead with this.
However, because of how we work, it is very likely that various other karpatkey team members will contribute their skills on a per-need basis. Some examples of this are:
- internal advisory from our in-house Treasury Manager leading the effort of running validators for Gnosis Chain, for our staking program to be designed with the needs/benefits of validators in mind;
- internal advisory from our in-house Treasury Managers that led incentive campaigns across various projects, to make sure incentives are aligned;
- check-ins with our business development, DAO growth and governance teams to explore synergies between dYdX and other projects in the karpatkey network as well as opportunities for dYdX community members.
The specifics might change based on the needs of the Treasury SubDAO, but our larger karpatkey organisation will always be available to support this endeavour.
Time and resources will be dedicated towards this dYdX engagement from other teams in the karpatkey organisation, including (but not limited to):
- our in-house legal team, focusing on setting up a Cayman Foundation and related initial bootstrap activities. We expect our legal officer to be the main reference point for this, with help from our legal manager on a per-need basis;
- our in-house tech team will prepare all of the required pieces of infrastructure (e.g. SubDAO structure, reporting engine, etc). We expect one of our data engineers and one of our developers to contribute to this, with support from our tech lead, on a per-need basis;
- our governance and growth teams to collect feedback/suggestions from relevant stakeholders with the goal of continuously improving the initiative and serving the changing needs of the dYdX ecosystem;
- our marketing team to advocate and be an active dYdX ambassador.
Therefore, benchmarked with your estimations, karpatkey would bring higher contributions and value.
For reference, we have dedicated over a month on analysing, researching and sourcing the relevant information, engaging with stakeholders, refining the proposal, and communicating the value of it for dYdX. This has involved cross-functional work with contributions from our legal, tech, treasury management, strategy & operations, governance and marketing teams.
Additionally, overhead costs for the foundation set-up consist of between $50k and $60k during the first year (depending on the specifics of the setup). For Year 2 and onward, this cost decreases to $35,000 as the foundation expenses are reduced.
karpatkey will subsidise the costs associated with the initial setup of the Treasury SubDAO and Cayman Foundation infrastructure as a signal of our long-term commitment to the dYdX community.
We believe in dYdX and want our fees to reflect our alignment with the project. The minimum of $300k per year represents the break-even point during the first year. As you can see from the above, our approach naturally contributes towards the expansion of the ecosystem. In line with this, our engagement with dYdX had built-in KPIs and grows in profitability with the growth of dYdX.
This structure enables us to benefit only from high profits if we contribute to the substantial growth of the ecosystem rather than setting an elevated flat fee straight from the beginning.
This proposal is focused on directly responding to the Treasury SubDAO call to action shared by the dYdX Foundation. But, suggestions on possible scope expansions have already been shared.
Leveraging USDC in the context of DeFi strategies to generate additional yield is indeed one of this suggestions.
We decided to include this element as an optional so as not to go off-topic with respect to the call to action. However, if there is an interest from the community, this is a scope extension that can be introduced right away.
A clawback option is present in all of our engagements with DAOs. This ensures our continued engagement with the DAO is linked both to our performance and to the level of satisfaction of the DAO.
From the summary in our proposal: