Salt (SALT)

Basics

• Announced on:
• Mainnet release:
• Based in:
• Secured Automated Lending Technology
• “The SALT Lending Platform allows holders of blockchain assets to leverage their holdings as collateral for cash loans. SALT is the first asset-backed lending platform to give blockchain asset holders access to liquidity without them having to sell their tokens. SALT provides investors with an innovative and secure opportunity to lend against a high-growth asset class through a fully-collateralized debt vehicle. SALT is traditional lending secured by non-traditional collateral.”

History

• Halted withdrawals on 15-11-2022, probably due to FTX exposure.

Token

Launch

• SALT had an ICO in the summer of 2017.

• From Decrypt (30-9-2020):

"The SEC ruled that it was an illegally unregistered securities offering. SALT Blockchain must offer refunds for its 2017 ICO, which raised $47 million. The firm must also pay a $250,000 civil fine to the SEC within 10 days, and will register the SALT token as a security. SALT tokens were originally sold for $10 apiece during the ICO, but now trade for just $0.05, according to CoinGecko."

Technology

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

Governance

• Was classified CeFi on the HackerNoon rankings of 25-4-2019. "CeFi products are custodial, use centralized price feeds, initiate margin calls centrally, centrally determine interest rates, and centrally provide liquidity for their margin calls."

• A BIG side note, is that the blog was written by Kyle J Kistner who is Chief Vision Officer at bZx. He gave his own project the highest ranking. What a surprise.

Is it Trustworthy?

• From this extensive blog criticising Centralized and Decentralized Finance (16-12-2019):

"SALT token has simple utility:

Discount token — better rates on monthly payment on a loan

Membership token — users need to pay at least 1 SALT per year to be eligible for loans

Needless to say, market has deemed the token almost worthless. SALT raised $48.5M for their lending platform. The tokens marketcap at the time of writing is $3.5M. The largest market is, unsurprisingly, Huobi.

SEC was digging into Salt lending in 2018. The platform survived the scrutiny. Salt has afterwards become quite strict about who they let use their platform, so check your jurisdictions before registering on their platform.
The SALT token isn’t even mentioned on the website anymore. We’re sure the ICO investors are happy about that. At least it wasn’t another money grab that didn’t deliver anything, right?

Ironically, Salt Lending lets you lend nothing. They do let you borrow money with some interesting services, such as the ability to borrow USD by putting up a DASH masternode as collateral (the masternode is still earning staking rewards for you during this period). Also, DOGE is available as collateral.

They have a good insurance policy, but well, who doesn’t for collateral.

Summary:
+ Somehow survived SEC scrutiny
+ Interesting borrowing options
- Cannot become a lender
- VERY limited jurisdictions for users
- Lack of utility for SALT token, ICO history"

Roadmap

• Can be found [Insert link here].

Audits

• Bug bounty program can be found [insert here].

Team, Funding, Partnerships, etc.

Team

• Full team can be found [here].
• Voorhees, Erik; Board Director
• Owen, Shawn; CEO (Shawn became involved with blockchain technology through his advocacy of bitcoin in early 2011.)
• Yablon, Ben; Strategy, has fifteen years of legal expertise centered on emerging financial technology platforms and regulatory compliance as a partner at Atlas Law Group. Benjamin holds a bachelor’s degree in history and english from Saint Lawrence University and earned his Doctor of Jurisprudence from the University of Denver Sturm College of Law. He is a published author and sought after speaker on emerging technology.
• Perklin, Michael; Blockchain Security Advisor
• Shapiro, Jon; Blockchain Advisor

Partners 

• Partners: Shapeshift & KeepKey (obviously), Exodus, Jaxx, Cryptotronix, Ideas By Nature, Brave New Coin, Polsinelli, Transform Group, Bitcoin Marketing Team, Bank of the Future, Colorado Blockchain Capital, Token As A Service and Argon Group

• Partnered (18-12-2019) with Uphold;

"Uphold has announced a partnership with Salt Lending to provide its users with cash or stablecoin loans using cryptocurrencies as collateral. Uphold users can now secure loans through Salt against their holdings in BCH, BTC, ETH, DASH and XRP. In addition to bringing leading credit solutions to Uphold users, Salt has integrated Uphold wallets into its own platform, allowing the company’s growing user base to access Uphold’s products through their dashboard."