Argent

Argent is a wallet for ETH and ETH tokens that tries to make on-boarding easier. No paper back ups because you can create your own circle of trust, free tx, (they pay for gas costs), simple addresses with names instead of numbers and an in-app DEX using Kyber.

Basics

• Launched in 2018.
• Mainnet release: 19-5-2020
• Based in: London
• From their AMA (19-2-2020):

"Only you (not us, not anyone else) can access your assets. You can earn interest with Maker and Compound in a tap; and enjoy peace of mind by locking and unlocking, recovering without a seed phrase, and setting a daily transfer limit."

• Argent is currently (29-1-2020) in an invite-only beta, but it's fully functional.
• Integrated with WalletConnect. Users of the Argent mobile wallet can now use Uniswap, PoolTogether and many more Dapps thanks to this integration.
• The Dai Savings Rate from MakerDAO is live (29-1-2020) in Argent.

Audits & Exploits

• Bug bounty max payout is $50,000 (29-6-2020).
• Blockchain Security DB (29-6-2020) shows 7 audits. The latest was in 5-2020.
• From their AMA (19-2-2020):

"In our case, for example, we only push to production code that has been reviewed and tested internally AND audited by external auditors. There is no exception to that rule. You can find the audit reports here. On top of that we run a bug bounty program, and our smart contracts are public and open-source to ensure maximum scrutiny."

Bugs/Exploits

• Argent patched a really bad account draining vulnerability in its wallet software and contracts thanks to a responsible disclosure by Yoav Gaziel (2-12-2022).
• From Decrypt (20-6-2020):

"Security audits firm OpenZeppelin discovered a bug that could have led to users losing their funds. The bug would have allowed hackers to steal funds from wallets that didn’t have a certain security feature enabled. The bug has now been fixed—and no funds were stolen."

Governance

Admin Keys

• In their AMA (19-2-2020) there were multiple questions surrounding centralization and censorship:

"What if Argent disappeared? Or Apple kicked you off the App store?

1. If our App is removed from the Appstore: This does not impact existing users as the App would still be on your phone and you can keep using it.
2. The extreme scenario where Argent, the company, suddenly disappears, including our infrastructure: We have built the Argent Emergency Kit just for that. You can sign a transaction on your phone but submit it to the blockchain through any other wallet such as MEW or Metamask. The emergency kit is live on iOS, and should be ready next month latest on Android.

What if a dictatorship comes after you?

We’ve put ourselves in a position where we cannot harm users. How?

1. We’re non-custodial: we can’t take users’ funds even if we were taken over by a malicious actor
2. We’re censorship resistant: users can move their funds even if our infrastructure is taken down.
3. We limit the data we hold on users (email and phone only), which is why we plan to enable wallets to be created without a phone number, we target this for Q2 latest. The email will stay but it’s very easy for users to create new private emails with service such as protonmail.

What parts of Argent are centralized now?

The main component of the Argent wallet that is centralized is the relayer. However, the relayer is fully non-custodial as it cannot tamper with a transaction and we make it possible to not use the relayer through the Argent Emergency Kit. To further decentralise the relayer we are considering options such as connecting to the Gas Station Network.

We also have a centralised backend but its only purpose is to orchestrate certain flows between users and improve the user experience. However, by design the clients do not need to trust the backend, and all these flows can be achieved by interacting with the blockchain directly.

The Argent Guard Service can also be considered centralized but it’s not part of the wallet. It’s just a service that we offer to people for convenience and they can easily opt out. The overall Guardian model is fully decentralized since any Ethereum account can act as a guardian."

Tech

• Whitepaper can be found [insert here].
• Code can be viewed [insert here].
• Built on: Ethereum

Upgrades

• They launched (19-5-2020) its smart wallet app to the public after more than a year of beta development. 

Scaling

• From DeFi Prime (16-3-2021):

"The Argent team had a great write-up on their L1 and L2 plans. For the near future, they’ll be focusing on integrating with zkSync."

• Partnered up with Starkware (11-2021).

Other Details

• From their AMA (19-2-2020):

"Our security model is based on ‘Guardians’. A Guardian can be any other Ethereum account (your hardware wallet, or a friend, for example). They help you with specific security actions (like recovery) but never have access to your funds.

The seed (in our case the private key) is generated and stored locally on your phone. By design it never leaves your phone. On your phone it is encrypted with (a slow hash of) your PIN and if available the Secure Enclave, then stored in the local Keychain (the most secure element of you phone).

Since the private key never leaves the phone it cannot be restored by your Guardians. But what your Guardians can do is collectively define a new private key as the legitimate owner of your wallet. This is only possible because Argent is a smart-contract wallet."

On privacy

"Personal data: we only store your email and phone number, we do not have other personal information. If you go through KYC for fiat to crypto on-ramp in Argent, it’s always done through 3rd parties, and they are the only ones seeing that data. We will soon make phone numbers optional.

App usage data: we use Amplitude for typical app metrics such as new downloads, on-boarding funnels (i.e. where do users drop in the process), % of users using Wallet Connect etc. Data in Amplitude is anonymized, we do not send any personal information (no email, no phone, no ens, no 0x address, etc…)

Why do you need a phone number when creating a wallet?

We wanted to prevent mass wallet creation without the need for you to prepay for gas. We’re now able to upgrade our wallet creation flow in a way that will remove the risks associated with this by leveraging the new Create2 EVM opcode."

On how they cover gas

"We use meta-transactions which allows us to pay for gas. In case anyone would like a quick explainer of meta-transactions, they’re similar to regular transactions but we add a relayer. With this you authorise a transaction and this information is sent to a relayer that pays the transaction and sends it to the destination. This means you don’t need assets to pay the fees.

The cost of this is not a significant at all compared to all our other costs (infrastructure, salaries, etc…).

As we add more functionalities to Argent, the cost will increase so we’re likely to introduce a fair use policy (i.e. a max amount per user per month). We are also believers that as Ethereum scales gas cost should decrease."

Roadmap

• From their AMA (19-2-2020):

"We’re now able to upgrade our wallet creation flow in a way that will remove the risks associated with [mass wallet creation] by leveraging the new Create2 EVM opcode. Shortly after this we’ll allow wallet creation without a phone. The exact date is not confirmed but April would be my current estimate.

When are you adding Maker Vaults?

We’re aiming for around Q2 of this year. The smart-contract integration is complete but awaiting external audit. When that is done we’ll start the integration in the iOS and Android clients.

Fiat on and off-ramps

For onramp we use Moonpay and Wyre. We’re exploring the best options for off-ramps at the moment.

TokenSets and Pool Together?

We’re on it!"

Usage

• From DeFi Weekly (12-5-2020): "Argent has a $30m+ valuation with less than 3,000 users."

Team, Funding, Partners

Team

• Team can be found in the link.
• Gerald Goldstein; CTO, "Gerald is Chief Technology Officer of Argent. Before this he was the CTO of Peak, which he co-founded with Itamar. Peak is a leading mobile cognitive training service with over 50M users. It was acquired by Lagardere in 2016. Prior to Peak he founded a start-up in the travel sector. He holds a PhD in nuclear physics."
• Julien Niset; CSO, "Julien is Chief Science Officer of Argent. He previously founded SQR Technologies, a quantum information startup. The IP was successfully acquired by ID Quantique, the world leader in quantum cryptography and quantum security hardware. He holds three patents related to his PhD in quantum information and quantum cryptography."
• Itamar Lesuisse; CEO, "Itamar is CEO of Argent. He was previously the CEO of Peak, which he co-founded with Gerald. Peak was acquired by Lagardere in 2016. Prior to Peak he worked at Visa, Amazon and BCG. He holds four payments-related patents and has a Masters in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering."

Funding

• Raised a $40m Series B (28-4-2022).
• From their own blog (9-3-2020):

"Raised a $12m Series A, led by Paradigm. Also backing us are Robert Leshner, founder of Compound, and our existing investors: Index Ventures, Creandum and firstminute."

• Backed by six companies.

Partners

• Partnered with Index COOP (15-3-2022).
• Is a member of DeFi Nation, created by Mosendo (24-5-2020)
• One of (23-3-2020) the customers of Dune Analytics.
• From their blog (8-2-2022):

"Partnered with LayerSwap to give you an easy way to fund your Argent Layer 2 account from a crypto exchange like Coinbase or Binance."

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