Title: Q2 Review of Meta-Gov Data
Contributors: @Cedrick, @Lavi
Date: June 30, 2021
Summary
Below is a high-level overview of certain meta-governance data over the past quarter. Among other things, this addresses (i) our ownership of the tokens underlying DPI, (ii) data surrounding meeting/missing quorum and (iii) a look at top voters and delegation.
All figures included here are calculated as of June 28, 2021 and rely on Etherscan and Coingecko data, as well as the sources noted below.
Ownership
Index Coop controls an average of approximately 0.75% of the currently-circulating tokens of each of the protocols underlying DPI. The lowest ownership is of UNI (0.3%) and the highest is KNC (1.52%):
Note: KNC is going through a token migration. We update these figures monthly on the Meta-Gov Dashboard.
Index Coop has the ability to engage in meta-governance votes only for UNI, AAVE, COMP, YFI and BAL. For those protocols, Index Coop’s effective voting power is higher than these ownership amounts suggest, as not all currently circulating tokens from each of these protocols vote. For example, in AAVE Proposal #18, Index Coop voted 74.8K AAVE in favor of the proposal out of ~3.3M votes, meaning Index Coop controlled ~2.3% of that vote (despite owning only ~0.5% of all outstanding AAVE).
These ownership and voting power figures sound small. However, they are still significant for a couple reasons:
- The ownership of each protocol within DPI is growing. Since May 29, 2021, the ownership of each protocol within DPI has increased by an average of 25 bps. This ownership will continue to grow as we scale.
- Despite these ownership totals, Index Coop is already one of the largest voters in these proposals (when we participate). For example, Index Coop was the 7th biggest voter in COMP-44.
- Even small ownership percentages can still have a high impact. In TradFi, investors are often able to facilitate important changes at companies with only a very small <5% (or much less) ownership.
The more Index Coop is able to demonstrate to the protocols within DPI that Index Coop is an active, thoughtful and consistent participant in meta-gov votes, the further our voting power will take us.
Quorum
As has been discussed, we frequently do not reach quorum for meta-governance votes. Below is a summary of all meta-gov votes that have taken place since March 25, 2021:
In this period, we have reached quorum in 5 out of 24 votes, so we reach quorum and actually participate in meta-governance just under 21% of the time. This is significant voting power left on the table.
Looking at the above 24 meta-gov votes, both the number of unique voters participating in each vote and the number of INDEX participating in each vote has decreased over time (recognizing that this is a small dataset).
The number of INDEX cast per vote generally decreases significantly whenever (i) votes take place over the weekend and (ii) votes have 2-day deadlines (as opposed to longer voting periods). Due to the nature of meta-gov, Index Coop has no control as to when meta-gov votes go live or for how long voting remains open.
Votes
Below is a breakdown of the top 10 largest INDEX holders who have participated in governance, according to Boardroom’s new screener (Boardroom Management Portal). Note that the “Last Cast Power” figures include INDEX that has been delegated to a particular voter:
Quorum for our most recent meta-gov vote, COMP-50, was 95,817 INDEX (5% of INDEX circulating supply, according to Coingecko). Our top holder in the above list gets us to 83.4% of quorum if he or she participates. Our top two holders can easily surpass quorum if they each vote.
Since Snapshot delegation began being emphasized on June 7th, a total of ~28,627 INDEX have been delegated in 17 delegations to 8 total delegates (shoutout to delegate @oneski22 (davidev.eth) for providing this data, who is now on the top 10 voter list above as a result of delegations). Encouraging more delegation will be extremely useful in ensuring we reach quorum more consistently, as delegates are expected to participate in each vote.
The proposed Meta-Governance Committee (IIP coming to Snapshot shortly) will ensure we always participate in meta-gov votes, even if the community does not reach quorum on its own. Ideally, however, by delegating enough votes, the community will begin reaching quorum on more meta-gov votes and will not require the MGC to step in as a backstop.
Helpful Gov / Meta-Gov Resources
Below are two helpful resources for analyzing governance/meta-gov, in case of interest:
- Boardroom DAO Screener: Boardroom Management Portal
Boardroom has created a screener for the DAO ecosystem. Through the screener, you can identify all DAOs, their treasuries, what framework they use for governance (i.e., Snapshot, Moloch, etc.), and how many proposals/ballots/votes they have.
Index Coop has the fifth most ballots cast and is sixth in terms of number of voters.
You can also use Boardroom to vote in Index Coop governance/meta-gov votes instead of Snapshot. We are currently in the process of updating/customizing the Index Coop page: Boardroom Management Portal
Tally is a governance analysis tool. Within DPI, only Uniswap and Compound are available on Tally. Tally is a useful way to identify who top voters are for those protocols, when votes come in, and what the requirements are for making proposals / quorum / votes succeeding.
I’m noticing ~31K delegated INDEX participating in one of the current IIPs.