Stake DAO (SDT)

From their going live blog post:

"Stake DAO removes the need to stake your assets across multiple platforms. We provide a simple solution for staking a variety of tokens all from one dashboard. Stake DAO users will be able to invest in NFTs used in systems such as Sorare, Axie Infinity or Cometh through the first NFT Hedge fund — BlackPool. Brand new concepts such as Social tokens will also be condensed into unique index funds, meaning users can easily gain exposure to the newest emerging digital economies."

Basics

• Started in / Announced on:
• Mainnet release: 21-1-2021

History

• From Rekt (8-7-2021):

"The arrival of Stake DAO was not without its own drama. Yearn developers accused Julien of forking their protocol without adding anything of his own, leading to Julien being kicked out of several private group chats and further intensifying a feud that had been brewing for some time.

As soon as Stake DAO arrived, Yearn began to heavily promote their yveCRV vault on Twitter, and the race was on. During the period of January - March 2021, Yearn and Stake DAO were directly competing for CRV deposits. Each protocol was aggressively promoting their vaults and lobbying for CRV whales to deposit into their respective platforms.

When Yearn introduced the yveCRV<>ETH pool in early February, allowing users to withdraw from the backscratcher, this improved the deal and increased the competition, as users were no longer trapped in the strategy. Despite the fact that users could now withdraw their CRV, the vault still continued to grow, as Yearn used their partnership with SushiSwap to incentivise the yveCRV<>ETH pool, creating a boosted APY that increased the demand for yveCRV.

This improved UX forced Stake DAO to provide the same service, and a sdveCRV Balancer pool was released in May, with an 90/10 sdveCRV/CRV ratio, still incentivising users to lock their CRV, but also providing some exit liquidity for those who wished to unlock."

Audits & Exploits

• This protocol offers no bug bounty (7-3-2022).
• Scored 65% on DeFi Safety (7-3-2022):

"This protocol has not documented an audit. This protocol's software architecture is documented. There is no coverage of deployed contracts by software function documentation. There is no evidence of code coverage testing. However, SakeDAO does have robust testing. This protocol has not undergone formal verification."

With the comment:

"We're happy to announce that after some great collaborations with the development team StakeDAO has massively improved their score. This was primarily achieved via great documentation relating to access controls. This protocol does a really good job of explaining to users how contract ownership functions in clear and comprehensible language accessible to all users. Few DeFi protocols do this! This protocol could improve its security offering with an external smart contract audit as well as a bug bounty. StakeDAO's documentation offering will also be enhanced once they begin to show specific contract function documentation, something users can look forward to in the not too distant future."

Governance

Admin Keys

• From DeFi Safety (7-3-2022):

"The StakeDAO smart contracts' state variables are immutable, therefore disabling admin ownership of any kind of user funds or information. The ownership of StakeDAO's deployer smart contracts and a MultiSig are clearly detailed in their Admin Control documentation. In addition, decentralized DAO information can be found here. This includes:  - Deployer address can change smart contract connections - Deployed can call harvest() - MultiSig can control SDT inflation via the MasterChef - MasterChef features and incentives can be tweaked and passed through a Timelock.

StakeDAO's lack of a Pause Control is explained in their GitHub documentation. In addition, the absence of a Pause function can be excused by the fact that the protocol's smart contract state variables are currently immutable. StakeDAO adequately documents their timelock here. StakeDAO's timelock has a length of 8h, and the reasons why are explained here."

DAO

• From their blog (21-1-2021):

"SDT holders will be able to vote on topics such as adding a new token to the DAO or changing token distribution rates, or they can use their SDT to open a new vote, and propose other changes to the DAO."

• Raised some eyebrows when the team made changes without voting (19-4-2021):

"We have taken the decision to reduce emissions from 5 SDT per block to 4 SDT per block."

Token

Launch

• Had a botched airdrop of 1.5 million SDT tokens (1.5% of total SDT supply) on 21-1-2021. They planned to airdrop tokens to a long list of addresses that participated in governance in other projects, plus to subscribers of Rekt or donors to Gitcoin round 8. However, hundreds of eligible address holders were not able to claim tokens.

Utility

• From their blog (21-1-2021):

"SDT is the token of Stake DAO, earned by users who deposit their tokens into the DAO. SDT holders can then stake their earned SDT to receive a share of the DAO fees. The SDT token will also provide governance rights to the holder."

Technology

• Whitepaper can be found here.
• Code can be viewed here. From DeFi Safety (7-3-2022):

"At just 12 commits in their stablecoin-rewards repo, there is not good evidence of a strong development history. This protocol's GitHub repository needs overhauling and is very difficult to navigate."

Implementations

• Built on: Ethereum, Avalanche, BNB Smart Chain, Polygon and Harmony (7-3-2022).

Interoperability

• From their blog (21-1-2021):

"We support DeFi on all networks, not just Ethereum. Stake DAO also supports Polkadot, Solana and Near, with plans to add further networks in the future with features such as liquid staking and cross-chain bridges."

Oracle Method

• From DeFi Safety (7-3-2022):

"The protocol's oracle source is documented. There is basic software function documentation linked to Rari's Fuse Pool (their oracle of choice). Front running mitigation lies within the underlying software design of StakeDAO, as their core strategies' APY aren't really affected by the order of transactions in the mempool. Front running transactions therefore becomes a fruitless endeavor. This protocol documents flashloan countermeasures via withdrawal fees in their documentation."

Roadmap

• Can be found [Insert link here].

Competition

• yEarn, Convex and other yield optimizers.

Pros and Cons

Cons

• Had a botched airdrop of 1.5 million SDT tokens (1.5% of total SDT supply) on 21-1-2021. They planned to airdrop tokens to a long list of addresses that participated in governance in other projects, plus to subscribers of Rekt or donors to Gitcoin round 8. However, hundreds of eligible address holders were not able to claim tokens.
• Raised some eyebrows when the team made block reward changes without voting (19-4-2021).

Team, Funding, Partners

Team

• Full team can be found [here].
• Julien Bouteloup is the only public developer of StakeDAO.
• Does not have an official team, but is has contributions of a variety of different people from the space (22-1-2021). Some notables are people from Aave (Stani and others), Ledger, Web3 Foundation, Kr1,0xMaki and Julien Bouteloup.

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