As DeFi becomes more widely adopted, new blockchains, Layer-2 scaling solutions, bridges and DEXs are being released at a rapid rate. While this diversity is a net positive for the crypto space, it also brings about new challenges.

How can users move their assets across all these networks and protocols and capitalise on the growing number of opportunities without sacrificing speed, security and cost efficiency? 

Traditional methods often involve multiple steps, such as transferring funds across expensive and time-consuming bridges, sending assets between multiple wallets, or using centralised exchanges as a bridging workaround.

To address these challenges, Minterest is excited to announce it will be integrating Swing as part of phase 1 of its Multi-Chain Strategy. During this phase—Single Chain Deployment—users will be able to bridge assets to Ethereum using Swing for use on Minterest. As part of the longer-term roadmap, the integration will be optimised to include a ‘Bridge and Supply’ feature.

This collaboration aims to simplify cross-chain liquidity. With Swing, Minterest can tap into global crypto liquidity, offering users reduced fees, faster transactions, and an intuitive lending and borrowing experience.

Swing & Minterest: Bridging the Divide

Swing aggregates bridges and DEXs to enable seamless asset transfers across blockchains. By integrating Swing, Minterest saves users time and money by bypassing unnecessary transactions and avoiding potential security vulnerabilities that cross-chain lenders and borrowers often face.

In one sentence, Minterest utilises Swing’s advanced features to unlock a little cross-chain magic!

Swing’s Features & Utility:

• Connectivity: Links to over 25 blockchains, offering diverse asset management options.
• Aggregation: By aggregating 60+ bridges and DEXs, Swing provides a one-stop solution for cross-chain transfers.
• Liquidity: Taps into $6 Billion of ready liquidity, optimising transactions for reduced slippage.
• Plug-and-Play Functionality: Swing’s user-friendly widget allows users to quickly review their positions and carry out cross-chain migrations without the typical bridging complexities.

Swing stands out as a unique aggregator in the DeFi space. Unlike traditional platforms, it gives users the autonomy to choose the bridge they trust the most. Every transaction depends on the user’s chosen setup—the bridge and the assets involved. 

Minterest doesn’t directly display, transfer, or store bridged assets. Instead, it leverages the Swing widget’s plug-and-play functionality, acting as an intermediary. This allows users to quickly review their positions and carry out cross-chain migrations with minimal hassle.

This flexibility ensures that users are not confined to a one-size-fits-all solution but have the freedom to tailor their cross-chain activities based on their preferences and risk appetite.

What does this mean for LPs and borrowers?

Minterest’s goal is to ensure that while the technology behind the scenes may be complex, the user experience remains intuitive, cost-effective and secure.

Let’s illustrate by comparing a traditional opportunity to one utilising Swing on Minterest.

Traditional Approach:

A user wants to take advantage of a time-sensitive, high-yield lending opportunity on Minterest’s Ethereum platform but is holding $USDC tokens on the Polygon blockchain.

Traditionally, they would have to navigate multiple steps on an external platform to bridge their $USDC from Polygon to Ethereum. This process often involves several transactions and intermediaries, leading to increased costs and wasted time.

With Minterest and Swing:

Disclaimer: The following is a hypothetical example for illustrative purposes only. Minterest does not have immediate plans to deploy on Polygon.

With Minterest’s Swing Integration, the process is streamlined:

1. The user holding $USDC on Polygon identifies the lending opportunity on Minterest’s Ethereum deployment.
2. Instead of navigating elsewhere, they open the Swing modal to start the bridging process.
3. The modal instantly detects the $USDC holdings on Polygon.
4. With a few clicks, Swing facilitates the bridging of $USDC from Polygon to Ethereum.
5. The $USDC tokens can now be lent on Ethereum to start earning yield.

The result? A simplified and expanded lending and borrowing experience that allows them to take advantage of cross-chain opportunities with fewer steps, saving both time and costs and the usual hassle.

The Future of Multi-Chain Lending & Borrowing

Minterest is gearing up for a significant shift—the introduction of a multi-chain platform by 2025. Central to this is the integration of Swing, which will allow lenders and borrowers efficient and secure asset transfers and unlock opportunities across 25+ blockchains! 

Here’s what Martti Kullang, Chief Product Officer at Minterest had to say about the Swing integration: 

“By incorporating this user-friendly bridging tool within the Minterest application, we’ve made it effortless for users to bridge assets to chains supported by Minterest. This tool not only simplifies the user experience but also encourages more users to engage. As a result, this integration contributes to the expansion of our user base and ensures a more accessible and efficient service for our community.”

Users no longer need to grapple with intricate bridging processes. Instead, they can supply assets on Minterest from one chain to another with just a few clicks!

This collaboration not only broadens the scope of opportunities for users but also underscores Minterest’s commitment to diversifying and enhancing DeFi’s lending and borrowing sector.

For more insights into Minterest’s partnerships, development announcements and how you can be a part of the $MINTY community, check out some recent articles, follow Minterest on Twitter, and drop by the Telegram or Discord channel for a chat!

As Minterest gears up for its public launch on the Ethereum mainnet in Q1 2024, our team is working diligently to ensure a smooth roll-out. With launch preparations underway, we are ready to reveal a larger strategic roadmap which has been brewing behind the scenes: Minterest’s multi-chain direction.

A New Blockchain Landscape

Between 2022 and 2023, there has been a remarkable surge in the number of Layer 1 and Layer 2 blockchains. With Vitalik, himself, championing an ecosystem of Layer 2s on Ethereum, the emergence of parallel operating L2s like Polygon 2.0 and Optimism, and the availability of rollups-as-a-service that can establish L2s in mere minutes – the blockchain landscape is rapidly changing.

Despite the ambition, these blockchains face a challenge: establishing dynamic ecosystems that draw both substantial user traction and high-value transactions. With most chains being general-purpose, integrating DeFi becomes essential. And, there is a growing demand for reliable lending protocols, with blockchain foundations eagerly scouting for teams and protocols that epitomise security and stability.

Liquidity Fragmentation: The Challenge

Liquidity remains a cornerstone for chains. Yet, over 50% of active liquidity is anchored on Ethereum, while the rest is spread across over 100 chains. This dispersion poses macro inefficiencies and systemic challenges, such as inconsistent token asset pricing across chains to the emergence of incompatible derivative tokens (i.e. multiple wrapped versions of USDT), further fragmenting liquidity.

As more chains emerge, this fragmentation is set to escalate, possibly hampering the expansion of Web3 liquidity. Addressing this issue becomes vital.

Minterest’s Roadmap to Unify Liquidity

We envisage a multi-chain future where diverse chains can seamlessly interact. Minterest is driven to engineer a landscape where chains have access to ample, compatible liquidity regardless of its origin. Liquidity will effectively act as a public good and significantly enhance macro-level market efficiency where chains can then focus on their unique offerings and treat access to liquidity as a given. 

The aspiration is to expand Minterest’s architecture to ensure authentic cross-chain interoperability. This approach enables lending on one chain while borrowing on another, seamless liquidity migration, swapping of debt assets across chains, and holistic protocol health maintained via the Minterest Solvency Engine that expands to handle cross-chain liquidations among other features.

Minterest’s roadmap now expands into 2025 encompassing three distinct phases.

• Phase 1: Single Chain Deployment – Q1 2024

Minterest’s Public Launch on Ethereum.

• Phase 2: Mirrored Deployments – Q2-Q4 2024

Sequential deployments of Minterest across chosen blockchains. Here, lending and borrowing activities are chain-specific. $MINTY tokens and Minterest NFTs can move across supported Minterest deployments while retaining the same benefits as on the Ethereum deployment. 

• Phase 3: Unifying Liquidity – Q4 2024/Q1 2025

Introducing genuine cross-chain lending and enhancing the solvency engine for cross-chain liquidations.

Each Minterest deployment seeks to unify liquidity, enabling partner chains to tap into an ever-growing liquidity network. The aim is to create a liquidity flywheel effect where liquidity attracts liquidity.

Stay tuned for additional details on Minterest’s cross-chain design, roadmap, and key partnership announcements.

Phase 1 Roadmap Revision

The comprehensive Minterest roadmap will be publicly updated to incorporate the multi-chain initiative. Additionally, after taking feedback from our community and partners into account we are adjusting the elements leading up to Public Launch to support the broader objectives for community growth and onboarding liquidity.

As communicated earlier, Public Launch and listing will occur at the same time and are scheduled for Q1 2024. We are actively working with listing partners to set a firm date. Upon confirmation, the Private Access campaigns will roll out five weeks ahead, succeeded by Public Access introductions three weeks before the grand launch. 

Why the campaign dates are being adjusted is related to a number of recent engagements with liquidity providers. Many have shifted to a monthly P&L framework necessitating meticulous capital allocation plans that prefer a liquid $MINTY token. Streamlining the Private/Public Access campaign duration will now align closely to a firm Public Launch date. This phased approach is strategic, enabling Minterest to leverage $MINTY emissions to amplify rewards and onboard TVL rapidly.

$MINTY Fresh Community Campaign Teaser

We acknowledge that many in the Minterest community cannot contribute liquidity to Minterest due to the cost prohibitive nature of Ethereum so our team has been ideating solutions to reward proactive members in the run-up to the Public Launch.

In November, we’re launching an incentivised community campaign: $MINTY Fresh. This campaign will promote community growth, engagement, and education of Minterest. Exciting rewards, including a generous pool of $MINTY and potential NFT drops, await. More details to come shortly!

Closing Off

We are proud to finally share the future multi-chain vision of Minterest. Be on the lookout for a number of related announcements over the next several weeks that provide greater context and clarity. 

The Minterest team is operating with best laid plans for the success of the Minterest protocol and testing it methodically at every quarter. Some adjustments along the way are to be expected, but we will continue to progress forward with the intention of fulfilling Minterest’s mission to be the leading decentralised money market in Web3.

Minterest’s innovative approach to emission rewards & buybacks, protocol sustainability, and long-term value creation.

TVL is typically used to gauge a protocol’s success, stability, and security. Although useful in measuring growth and deposit trends, it fails to capture the bigger picture. TVL doesn’t effectively indicate a protocol’s sustainability or user benefits and is often used as a misleading marketing tool.

Minterest has developed a suite of features and mechanisms that go beyond superficial metrics. By addressing the commonly overlooked issues of token utility and a sustainable incentives model, Minterest aims to grow and retain TVL and its user base—a win-win for the protocol and its participants.

DeFi’s Overlooked Challenges

While TVL is an important metric, it shouldn’t act as the be-all and end-all of a protocol’s success or value. In fact, many ‘seemingly successful’ projects have fallen victim to the challenges and pitfalls of DeFi.

Insufficient Incentives

DeFi protocols offer incentives to borrow from or provide liquidity to their platforms, but these rewards are often insignificant—especially for blue chip coins and tokens. 

Cryptocurrencies like $ETH, $wBTC, and stablecoins are considered relatively safe investments and usually have a much higher TVL than low-cap, volatile alternatives. Because of this oversaturation of liquidity, APRs for LPs are regularly less than 5%.

The Cycle of Rotating Capital

Some protocols compensate for low APRs by providing native tokens (emission rewards) as an additional incentive. This is a bonus for users and a great way for projects to build out-of-the-gate TVL and bootstrap liquidity. 

However, if a well-planned tokenomics and utility model is not employed, this approach can quickly lead to detrimental consequences.

When tokens lack legitimate use cases or are plagued by high inflation rates, recipients have little incentive to hold long-term. They’ll likely opt to sell at the first opportunity and move on to bigger and better things.

Over the years, this cycle of ‘rotating capital’ has taken its toll on countless protocols.

Here’s a simplified representation of how it typically unfolds:

1. Decline in TVL: The influx of emission rewards or lack of token utility leads to the price depreciation of the project’s native token and a consequent decrease in TVL as the perceived value of the protocol diminishes.
2. Migration of Liquidity Providers: Liquidity providers, in pursuit of better returns, relocate their capital to other, more promising ventures, leaving the initial one struggling to maintain liquidity.
3. Desertion of the Protocol: With diminished liquidity and user engagement, the protocol is abandoned by LPs and borrowers, left struggling to attract new users and capital.

Utility, Incentives and Performance Value: The Minterest Difference

Now that we’ve introduced some of the pitfalls of everyday borrow/lend protocols, it’s time to ask an important question:

“What sets Minterest apart?”

MINTY Tokens, NFTs and the Buyback Mechanism

Let’s start by introducing $MINTY – Minterest’s native token. Liquidity suppliers and borrowers receive emission rewards in $MINTY for using the platform—in addition to supply and borrow APYs—and are incentivised to participate in protocol governance (voting and decision-making).

If holding one of Minterest’s yield enhancing NFTs, users will earn a further boost in $MINTY emissions ranging from 20% to 50%.

Finally, users who stake their $MINTY tokens and participate in governance earn additional buyback rewards—$MINTY tokens, acquired on-market by the protocol’s ‘buyback mechanism’ and accumulated in the treasury.

Here’s how it works:

• 1. Deposit: Lucy deposits 5 $ETH into the Minterest platform.
• 2. Earnings: Based on the 4% supply APY, Lucy earned 0.2 $ETH over the year. Additionally, she receives a 30% $MINTY APY. On top of this, Lucy holds a yield boosting NFT that provides a 40% boost, driving her $MINTY APY from 30% to 42%, earning her 1,000 $MINTY tokens.
• 3. Staking: Lucy then stakes her 1,000 $MINTY tokens to participate in protocol governance.
• 4. Value Accrual: Minterest generates value through fees from borrowing and lending.
• 5. Buyback Mechanism: The protocol uses value generated to activate the buyback mechanism, purchasing 200 $MINTY tokens from the open market.
• 6. Allocation: The bought-back 200 $MINTY tokens are then allocated to Lucy based on her contribution to staking and governance.
• 7. Enhanced APY: This allocation of additional $MINTY tokens effectively enhances Lucy’s original 4% + 42% APY, providing her with increased overall yield from the platform.

This increases Lucy’s total holding to 1,200 $MINTY tokens and reduces the available supply of $MINTY on the market, creating scarcity. 

 Please note, that arbitrary numbers have been used for example purposes.

This strategic approach to tokenomics and reward distribution ensures that value is continually returned to the users, incentivising staking and enhancing the APYs the protocol provides to its users.

Solvency Management: A Focus on Stability and User Protection

Minterest stands out with its solvency management and liquidation approach, focusing on user protection and protocol stability. 

The protocol constantly checks the USD value of all borrower collateral positions against the utilisation ratio. This ratio is crucial—it represents the total value of all loans, including accrued interest, compared to the value of the collateral.

On other lending protocols, when the ratio reaches 1.0, external liquidators and bots buy up to 50% of under-collateralised borrow positions at market rate discounts, ranging from 5% to 15%. 

Instead, Minterest’s smart contracts handle the liquidation in-house via the Solvency Engine, affecting only the necessary amount of collateral to regain solvency—plus a small buffer to avoid recurrent liquidation events.

Minterest’s Balanced and Sustainable Economic Model

Minterest is not just about accumulating assets; it’s about creating a balanced and sustainable economic model that prioritises long-term value and user benefits over misleading metrics and short-term gains.

It addresses overlooked challenges in the sector, such as insufficient incentives and the detrimental cycle of rotating capital. This is achieved through features like $MINTY utility tokens with a buyback mechanism, a dynamic interest rate model, and a unique approach to liquidations and solvency management.

To learn more about the Minterest ecosystem and how you can get involved, check out the official documentation, follow us on Twitter, and drop by the Discord channel for a chat with the $MINTY community!

Central to Minterest’s operations is growing and maintaining the Total Value Locked (TVL) on the protocol where there is a critical necessity to ensure the safety of user portfolio positions. In this piece, we will conduct a comprehensive exploration of the Minterest Health Gauge and its application in measuring and supporting loan health.

Understanding Loan Dynamics within Minterest

Minterest operates by facilitating over-collateralised loans. This essentially implies that every loan is supported by collateral with a value surpassing the loan amount. Illustratively, if Bob procures a loan of $50 USDT, he is obligated to collateralize it with assets worth considerably more – let’s say with Bitcoin worth at least $65 USDT.

Due to the inherent volatility of the crypto markets, the relative value of a loan’s collateral can oscillate. If this value diminishes below a predetermined threshold, the loan is liable for partial or full liquidation. To contextualise, should the value of Bob’s Bitcoin collateral reduce below $65, Minterest would instigate a liquidation process to settle the loan.

Deciphering the ‘Health Gauge’

Situated on the user dashboard, the Health Gauge serves as an instrument for users to monitor their loan positions. 

This mechanism presents a numeric value termed the “Health Factor”. A value exceeding “1” denotes stability, whereas a figure below “1” represents an insolvent position that is open for liquidation by Minterest’s Solvency Engine.

Computational Framework for Portfolio Health

Minterest’s architecture is distinct in its allowance for a basket of token assets to be used collectively to back loan positions. This structure aids users in diversifying their exposure across a wider set of collaterals to mitigate risk. However, it concurrently introduces a nuanced layer of computational complexity.

In Minterest’s holistic approach, liquidity is aggregated as the user marks which supply positions can be used as collateral. From there Minterest calculates the maximum allowable loan available to the user. 

For illustrative clarity, if Alice commits 10 USD each to DAI, USDT, and USDC markets and designates DAI and USDT for use as collateral, her total collateral valuation is 20 USD. 

The maximum amount of her loan borrow position is defined by the “Utilisation Limits” of each market. Let’s say that USDT has an 80% limit and DAI a 70% limit.  The maximum permissible loan available for Alice is computed as:

10 USD * 80% (USDT) + 10 USD * 70% (DAI) = 15 USD

This computation underscores that Alice maintains a stable position with a collateral value of 20 USD, provided her loan remains within the 0 to 15 USD bracket.

To come back full-circle with this example, assume Alice decides to borrow 7 USDT. The ratio between this and the value of her total collateral is her position’s Health Factor:

15 USD / 7 USD (USDT) = 2.14

Since Alice’s Health Factor is above 1, she is currently safe from a liquidation event.

Advancing Portfolio Risk Management

Beyond the Health Gauge, Minterest has been developing AI-imbued mathematical models for an advanced risk engine. This model draws from year-spanning data sets and evaluates real-time price fluctuations to estimate potential liquidation events. A key challenge highlighted during our focus group studies is that while predictive models do offer valuable insights, they don’t always translate to direct, actionable steps for liquidity providers.

To address this, Minterest’s team is developing a broader set of risk management tools to facilitate informed portfolio management decisions. These enhancements include risk alerts based on key metrics, allowing for automating select actions such as repayments, and superimposing a user’s loan position atop chart data of aggregated historical liquidation “heat zones” among other features which will be included in the 2024 roadmap.

Minterest’s primary aim is to equip users with accurate, timely data to support informed portfolio decisions. With tools like the Health Gauge and the forthcoming refined risk assessment tools, Minterest remains committed to meeting the practical needs of its user base.

This post is written by Minterest’s Head of Product, Martti Kullang

Dear Minterest Supporters,

Over the past few months, we’ve been hard at work behind the scenes crafting a new chapter in the Minterest journey. And as a small, but important, visual marker to represent this moment we decided to do a refresh to the Minterest brand identity.  For the team, the exercise has been reinvigorating, perhaps a bit cathartic too. And though minor, the output is something that we are proud of. 

Typically, this form of work is done in isolation and the results simply appear across brand properties once completed. However, we thought that sharing the behind-the-scenes process for conducting the refresh might provide an interesting glimpse into the way our team thinks and operates. 

We have included plenty of visuals, drafts, and work-in-progress pieces that eventually culminated into what you will now see across all of Minterest’s properties.

A Fresh Feel

Conceptually, we loved the earlier look-and-feel of Minterest. The purple motifs and darker accents really stood out, and they felt professional. So the goal was not to do a major rebrand or alter the overall approach. Instead our team wanted to reevaluate what the brand projects with fresh eyes, and ensure there is consistency around its overall theme.  

The journey began with the brand’s colour language. As an infrastructural product focused on decentralised finance, Minterest needs to exude safety and security first and foremost. 

We explored over 15 different colour schemes and styles combinations, closely evaluating both the latest trends and classic evergreen styles used by respected brands for decades in finance. Some of the options were certainly bold ones which attracted attention as early favourites as you will see in the visual below.

Internal biases will always be there. So, to gain perspective, we invited a select group of individuals into our creative space and showed them different variations of the brand colour options under consideration. It quickly became apparent that what works well for eye-popping visibility doesn’t necessarily translate to communicating safety and security in managing people’s finances (here’s looking at you, fluorescent orange). Additionally, some of the choice options were simply overused across both finance and social media. We took the feedback and dug deeper to refine our options.

The Final Pick

We arrived at a colour palette that combines the calmness of nature (green) with the innovation of technology (blue). It’s a harmonious blend that encapsulates the essence of Minterest — a secure, professional, forward-looking DeFi platform. And, everything thematically aligns around the essence of the mint leaf.

We sketched out all Minterest assets in this palette, ensuring they resonated throughout the product. And finally we were able to craft an extensive brand book with the new approach that will be utilised by our designers and partners.

Product Re-Branding

We carried this colour refresh across the Minterest website and associated social content platforms.

The Minterest token icon — the heart of the Minterest brand — got some TLC too. The team made subtle adjustments to the size of the leaf, colour combinations, and the shape of the coin icon to provide a bit of a visual lift.

The new colour palette really aligned well with the recent rebranding of the Minterest token ticker symbol to MINTY as it symbolises more than just a token; it has a playful nature that brings to mind child-like enjoyment akin to “minties” — refreshing candies that leave a memorable taste in your mouth. We had some fun playing around with that concept, with more to come in the future.

The Minty-er Minterest App

The Minterest application should be intuitive, user-friendly, and efficient — just like the dashboard of a car, where crucial information is clear at a glance, but where deeper insights are always at your fingertips. The visual refresh certainly improves readability and makes it easier to navigate the app since there are now fewer contrasting elements. 

Final Thoughts

As we share insights for refreshing the Minterest brand, we do reflect on the journey taken until this point and how the process led us down a captivating rabbit hole of creativity for several months.

Even after finalising the “winning” style, we fine-tuned it for even better resonance. Every nook and cranny of the Minterest app needed a new brand review — from the navigation bar to modals and even dashboard gauges. It’s a meticulous but necessary process to ensure a seamless user experience.

In the end we are really satisfied with the new look-and-feel of the product, and how it all came together piece-by-piece. Kudos to the entire product team and Minterest ambassadors for their incredible support in helping to refresh Minterest. 

The updated design is now a foundation to build from and we have quite a bit more work coming down the pipeline as the Minterest app expands to incorporate more features moving towards its public launch. Stay tuned.

Warm regards,

Martti Kullang

Head of Product

Minterest

The Minterest Smart Contracts continue to evolve, but their foundational aspects, including the Minterest ERC20 token smart contract, remain unchanged. Existing token holders can rest assured that no action is needed on their part. The current Minterest Smart Contracts list is located on the Gitbook here.

Tokenomics are Maintained

All Minterest token holders continue to operate under the same terms as before. Cliff and unlock periods for early supporters remain unchanged, and rewards are still accruing in the same manner for liquidity providers.

Vestings for early supporters commenced in February 2023 and will be honoured as outlined in the Minterest Whitepaper and the table below.

Minterest Tokenomics

Honouring the 50% Uplift for Stakeholders

Earlier this year, the Minterest total token supply was reduced from 100 million to 65.9 million MINTY tokens (formerly MINTY) from the burning of a third of the supply. This process streamlined tokenomics by shortening the overall emissions schedule to 5 years and making the numbers simpler to understand over that period. The impact of this decision for the benefit of all Minterest stakeholders is significant.

The percentage share of the overall supply is more valuable to the stakeholders than the number of tokens they possess. Early supporters, who previously held 20% of the total supply, now have a 30% share — a 50% uplift in overall token value allocation.

Beyond Numbers, a Greater Impact

This shift transcends mere numbers; it will amplify community impact in future governance decisions. For liquidity providers, this represents an increased share of Minterest’s buyback rewards too.

Share of Token Supply Ownership

Embracing Stability and Long-Term Vision

Minterest tokenomics 2.0 introduced back in January 2023 was a carefully calculated move to benefit all token holders, magnifying the share and influence of each participant in the Minterest ecosystem. This remains a part of our ongoing commitment to instil stability and to chart a long-term vision of success with all stakeholders.

For more information on the path towards Public Launch, please read about the Minterest Roadmap.

The mission of the Minterest protocol is to be the leading decentralised money market in Web3. Minterest’s unique model aligns incentives through innovations, such as the Liquidation Engine*, that generate greater fees and redistribute them all back to users of the protocol.

Minterest bootstraps the onboarding of liquidity by distributing its governance token, MINTY, to users of the protocol in addition to the underlying market yield. Like many DeFi projects, Minterest grapples with the challenge of aligning incentives to drive liquidity for the long-term success of the protocol. This blog post aims to shed light on how Minterest’s Distribution Gateway system provides a solution.

What is the Distribution Gateway?

The Distribution Gateway is a sophisticated contract, meticulously designed to manage the substantial distribution of MINTY during the early stages of the protocol’s life without compromising the overall health of the protocol.

This system keeps track of rewards accrued by each user and ensures their even release over a 12-month span. Consequently, our early supporters benefit significantly, while the influence on the circulating supply is adeptly controlled, granting the protocol the vital time it needs to achieve widespread user adoption and broader token distribution.

The Problem of Lazy Data Storing

Diving deeper, it’s crucial to address a technical nuance inherent to all blockchains – the lazy storage of data.

To minimise gas costs, when rewards are to be distributed to multiple users, DeFi projects (including Minterest) deploy indexes – ever-increasing variables that aggregate rewards. Rather than updating each user’s balances, the distributor modifies only one value – the index. Subsequently, all reward recipients bear the gas costs to deduce their respective reward share.

This method is efficient concerning gas consumption. However, the index doesn’t record the specific dates of reward distribution. As highlighted, the Distribution Gateway requires these dates to suitably release the MINTY tokens over a year. So, how do we navigate this challenge?

How the Distribution Gateway Works

Our answer to the lazy data storage dilemma is a strategic compromise in the precision of token release to the market, yet still within the bounds acceptable by our business model. The Distribution Gateway does not monitor every single token. Instead, it comprises 12 slots, each representing earnings for a month. Should a user remain active, their earnings data for the past 30 days is housed in the pertinent slot. When withdrawal is set into motion, the system computes the amount that can be withdrawn using the formula:

claimableMnt = slotBalance1 /12*11 + slotBalance2/12*10+…+slotBalance12/12

Here, slotBalance12 refers to the earnings of the most recent month.

The internal logic within the contract approximates the number of tokens from each slot ready for release. This method doesn’t trace the exact status of individual tokens but monitors the monthly earnings for a user’s yearly activity on the protocol.

For clarity, consider the following graphical representation that shows the total and available withdrawal balances for a user who earns a consistent MINTY amount each month and actively engages with the protocol:

Earned Balance represents all MINTY earned, both withdrawable and non-withdrawable.

Withdrawable Balance indicates the amount of MINTY that users can withdraw to their wallets.

What are Active and Inactive Users?

An “active user” is one who engages with markets or their MINTY balance at least once within 30 days. This means that a user who does a supply, borrow, repay or withdraw action, as well as stakes or unstakes MINTY in the governance process, triggers an update of the Distribution Gateway.

The Distribution Gateway system works flawlessly for active users. But how about users who deposit assets and then await their rewards, not making any chain transactions for several months?

The Distribution Gateway has provisions for this scenario as well. If such a user decides to withdraw MINTY after months of inactivity, the system gauges the duration (or number of slots) of their absence. All collected rewards are aggregated, and an average value per slot is calculated. This value is then incorporated into the previously mentioned formula to determine the withdrawable sum.

However, a minor hiccup arises. If a user remains inactive beyond 30 days, the UI might display a decline in the withdrawable sum. This usually occurs post the slot transition, roughly every 30 days. This apparent discrepancy arises as the averaging logic employed at the contract level is mirrored on the UI.

For a clearer picture, consider this example:

• On the 30th day of slot 1, a user accrues 10 tokens, enabling them to withdraw 1/12 of this total = 0.833 MINTY. 
• By the first day of slot 2, the user’s total earnings amount to 12 tokens. However, due to their inactivity, the averaging logic is activated. The newly averaged earnings amount to 6 tokens per slot (i.e. 12 tokens earned across 2 months = 6 tokens per month), with the total withdrawable sum being approximately 1/12 of the 6 tokens = 0.5 tokens.

This dip might seem concerning initially, but the system rapidly recalibrates. It typically takes between 6 to 9 days to revert to the withdrawal amount observed at the end of slot 1. As a consequence, inactive users might observe the following pattern on the UI:

This is the so-called “saw pattern.” A similar chart will feature on the Minterest user dashboard to offer users a clearer forecast of impending rewards.

The Distribution Gateway has been carefully designed to manage the distribution of MINTY tokens in a manner that is both fair to early supporters and beneficial for the long-term health of the Minterest protocol. We understand the complexities and concerns users might have regarding reward distribution, and this mechanism ensures a balanced approach. We hope this deep dive has shed light on the intricacies and design sensibilities of the Distribution Gateway.

*Note that Minterest’s Autoliquidation Engine has been renamed to Solvency Engine.

Our aim was clear: nail down the most fitting ticker symbol for Minterest’s token. Criteria? It had to resonate with Minterest, give the project extra value, be catchy, enjoy strong community support, and stand out in the crowd.

From days filled with suggestions to passionate community campaigns and an edge-of-your-seat voting round, we’re thrilled to introduce: MINTY – the new face of Minterest’s token!

Here is a rewind of this historic adventure.

The community and Minterest team submitted a plethora of ticker options.  Suggestions spanned the gamut, from succinct acronyms like MNTX and MTRST to catchy ideas such as iLEND and FRESH.

Hearteningly, every finalist came directly from our community’s creative minds.

Meet the Top 3 Contenders

MINTY: Suggested by Telegram’s Bee AhhBee, MINTY was also on the radar of our in-house team. It’s a fitting name that smoothly rolls off the tongue. And judging by the enthusiasm, our marketing team is already buzzing about the mascot and merch potentials!

MIFI: Joe from Telegram threw this witty suggestion into the ring. Much like WiFi’s omnipresence, Minterest Finance aims to be an inseparable part of everyone’s digital existence. Joe‘s idea captured our goal to offer a constant financial presence that is as reliable as it is innovative.

MINTX: Hats off to Discord’s BuyNoEvil for this gem. With a subtle tweak to his original idea, MINTX is a testament to Minterest’s roots while hinting at a grander vision for a multi-chain universe.

The showdown took the spotlight on our Minterest X Twitter profile. The voting frenzy lasted a solid 48 hours with MINTX and MINTY competing for the top till the final whistle.

How Did We Pick?

We loved so many community suggestions, but to cut down to the top contenders, a few considerations took centre stage:

1.  Avoid the ‘MNT’ Trap: Kudos to Vectorize and sampeik for highlighting the potential pitfalls of ‘MNT’— it might muddy the waters with other projects out there.
2. Distinctiveness: Some suggestions were, unfortunately, lookalikes of existing projects.
3. Easy Recollection: Brands need to be memorable. Tickers such as MTRST, MINTR, and others had appeal, but when spelled or spoken, they didn’t quite hit the expectations.

Diving Into the MINTY Fresh Era!

MINTY is a calculated pick.

It’s catchy, easy-to-share, and embodies the enthusiasm of a dynamic community. It’s the kind of name people align with and speak of with pride.

Here’s what a couple of our esteemed Minterest’s advisors chimed in with:

Tough choice. I assume MINT was taken already. Personally I like MiFi best, then MintX because they are both edgy-cool, but I don’t think they are the best choice, as easy memorability for someone just learning of the project is paramount, as long as it’s still professional. So I…

— David Esser (@blockchainolgst) August 15, 2023

btw, "Minties" (MNTY's) are a very popular lolly / candy in Australia :))

— Dom Rohde (@allesdom) August 16, 2023

With MINTY on board, we’re in for a creative whirlwind. Picture sticker packs (‘Mintojis’, anyone?), desirable merchandise, or even real-life ‘Minty Minties’ candies? This minty revival adds a ton of substance to the Minterest narrative, a tale we’re crafting hand-in-hand with our supporters.

A big thanks to every participant for turning this page in Minterest’s history book!

As Minterest ventures into a new chapter with an updated roadmap, a brand refresh is in the air. More than a mere symbol, it signifies a fresh beginning for the Minterest project and our community. And what captures the essence of a Web3 project better than its Ticker Symbol?

Ticker symbols are more than labels; they become the brand’s signature, appearing across wallets, token tracker sites, lending protocols, bridges, DEX, centralised exchanges, and more. But a ticker’s true spirit resides in the community who passionately embrace it through online discourse and in real-life conversations, allowing it to effortlessly spread fast and far.

With Minterest, we’re on the hunt for a new Ticker Symbol that resonates with you, our community, forging a strong identity that you are proud of and embracing our shared identity across Web3. Your participation matters so let’s make history and create something iconic together!

How do you participate?

1. August 10-14: Suggest a Ticker Symbol in the community channels on Telegram or Discord.
2. August 15: A final selection, including community favourites will be put up for vote on X.
3. August 17: A winner is selected, and you become part of Minterest history!

Ticker Symbol requirements

• 3 to 5 letters: Think along the lines of BTC, AAVE, MATIC.
• Unique: Not actively in use by another token on top-tier DEXs or CEXs. CoinGecko and CMC are great research tools.
• Relevant: No MNT or any unrelated symbols.

The Fine Print

• Voice in the Process: The Minterest team will carefully consider each entry. We want to find a ticker that fits the brand and our community, and that might mean we’ll need to set aside some suggestions.
• Final Say: We respect and value your input, but the final decision on accepting the ticker symbol will ultimately lie with the Minterest team. 
• Play Fair: We encourage creativity, but make sure your suggestions comply with applicable laws and don’t infringe on others’ rights. We’re all in this together, building something special, and that means playing by the rules.

This is an opportunity to shape Minterest’s future. Your voice matters to us, and we look forward to hearing your creative ideas.

This article explores the near future for Minterest’s go-to-market roadmap, detailing the key upcoming phases that begin the march towards achieving Minterest’s mission. If you have not read the prior post that provides a baseline for Minterest’s current state, we would recommend you read it first here.

As a preface, the Minterest protocol has been operating without issue in a closed beta format (i.e., Private Launch) since early 2023. All subsequent development will build upon the underlying smart contracts, so that Minterest LP’s do not need to change their behaviour in any way.

1. Roadmap

The immediate roadmap is divided across three key phases, and is milestone-based, bound within timeframes but without hard dates. This approach provides needed flexibility for decision-making while maintaining a keen eye on capital efficiency for the team.

1.1 Private Access: Q1 2024

Private Access is a special protocol event held within the current private launch phase to drive attention to Minterest. Private Access is a closed environment campaign for lenders and borrowers offering Minterest participants with high rewards and allowing the team to put the protocol through its paces ensuring all functionality and features are operating as expected.

Included with Private Access:

• Limited access via Minterest NFT: Participation requires holding a Minterest NFT, available on marketplaces like OpenSea. Also note we are extending Minterest NFT validity periods by 12 months!
• High rewards: Significant increase in emissions and staking rewards. Reward rate will be communicated closer to the event.
• 5 markets open: USDC, USDT, DAI, WBTC, and ETH markets available, with borrow positions around 20% of LTV (Loan-To-Value).
• Governance token: Non-transferrable during this phase.

More information on the Private Access phase is available below.

1.2 Public Access: Q1 2024

Public Access opens the protocol to anyone with a supported Web3 wallet on Ethereum.

Included with Public Access:

• NFT Boost Starts: Rewards on emissions increase up to 50% via Minterest NFT.
• Autoliquidation engine* launches: Borrowing allowances increase to match industry LTV ratios of 70%-90%. Learn more about why the Minterest autoliquidation engine matters here. 
• Governance token: Non-transferable during this phase.

More details about Public Access in the weeks ahead.

1.3 Public Launch: Q1 2024

Public Launch builds on Public Access and unlocks vested governance tokens, allowing them to be transferable. 

Included with Public Launch:

• Governance token: Transferable.
• Listing: Key integrations and listings.

More details about Public Launch in the weeks ahead.

2. Private Access Preparation

Private Access is the first upcoming phase. Several initiatives are underway to support successful execution of Private Access, including:

• Product development: Improvements and features such as updated liquidation engine logic, streamlined health gauge, and adjusted dashboard views for accurate user rewards.
• Brand refresh: Minor refresh includes visual branding and governance token ticker symbol changes.
• Updated documentation: Updates to Whitepaper, Technical Paper, Gitbook, social channels, and new tutorial walkthroughs and videos.
• Liquidity building: Negotiations with institutional partners, whales, and others for onboarding liquidity.
• Partnerships: Building diverse ecosystem relationships rolling out publicly over several months that increase accessibility of Minterest to a larger user base.

Once the dates are finalised, further information will be provided.

Marching Forward Together

There is a lot to digest with the roadmap. And yet, there is still so much more to share, detailing out each phase, new and updated product features, community activities, and exciting campaigns planned – all coming to the blog in the weeks ahead.

Join us in the Minterest community channels on Telegram and Discord to participate in the conversation as we work together to shape the future of decentralised finance.

The Minterest team has addressed community questions related to the roadmap on the Minterest Gitbook under section Community Asks.

Edit: The Minterest team has addressed community questions related to the roadmap on the Minterest Gitbook under section Community Asks.

Edit: Nov 7, 2024 – Roadmap has been updated based on the latest announcements which positions Private Access and Public Access right ahead of Public Launch in Q1 2024 and includes the broader multi-chain strategy roll-out

*Note that Minterest’s Autoliquidation Engine has been renamed to Solvency Engine.

What are Minterest NFTs and what makes them unique?

For those who might be unfamiliar, Minterest NFTs, with their protocol-specific utility, present a unique use case among DeFi protocols. Our collection of 3000 NFTs, spread across 12 tiers, commemorates historically influential Blockchain pioneers and offers holders privileged access during the Private Launch, along with an emission boost for supply/borrow activities during the Public Launch.

So, what’s the latest on Minterest NFTs?

Emission boosts are time-bound, lasting anywhere from 5 months to over 3 years, depending on the NFT’s rarity. Since these NFTs were minted in February 2023, many of them are now reaching their expiration before Minterest transitions into its Public Launch phase, where the emission boost becomes active. Clearly, this doesn’t present a fair scenario for our NFT holders.

Is there a solution?

We’ve got one, and it extends for 12 months! 

Our team has found a way to update the NFT smart contract to extend the operational validity of the NFT emission boost. This means the validity period of the emission boost will be extended by an additional 12 months from the current expiry date for all holders, thereby revitalising all NFTs and extending their valuable use with the protocol. 

What’s more, NFT holders don’t need to lift a finger to receive this benefit!

Here’s a quick look at the old and new validity periods of the NFTs across all tiers:

A few important points to note.

Development in Progress: Our team is still in the process of scheduling this development work to extend the lifespan of the NFTs in the product roadmap. We will share an announcement once it is completed.

Public Launch Time Frame: Please note, the 12-month extension of the Minterest NFTs has no direct correlation with the time frame of the public launch.

Tokenomics Impact: As the original token allocation for the emission boosts is more than what will actually be used, there will be no impact on the circulating supply. A key benefit of extending the lifespan of the NFTs for the Minterest community is the anticipated wider distribution of the Minterest token to a scaling user base, thus expediting the move towards decentralisation.

We hope this update brings a smile to your faces, as we know this has been a pressing concern to the community for quite some time.

As of the time of writing, 835 of the 3000 Minterest NFTs have been minted. You can explore our collection on OpenSea here. Additionally, we invite you to browse our extensive NFT Gallery here.

Minterest’s roadmap is brimming with details, and we’ll be rolling these out across a series of  posts. Today, we’ll give you a short recap of where Minterest currently stands following our recent transition, setting the stage for what’s next.

Building Towards the Future

Our dedicated core team, the original builders of Minterest, are hard at work. We’re focusing on key features that will attract early adopters and building upon Minterest’s solid architecture. The engineering and product teams are working in tandem, plotting the roadmap ahead and setting up the technical infrastructure to support these plans.

Brand

The Minterest brand is here to stay, and you’ll soon see our online and social properties coming back to life. As we enter this new era, we’re also subtly refreshing our visual identity, symbolising the beginning of a new stage in Minterest’s journey.

Solid Technology Foundation

Minterest audited smart contracts deployed on the Ethereum mainnet form the foundation we will build upon. All six security audit reports by reputable firms including Trail of Bits, Peckshield, Hacken, and Zokyo are readily accessible on Minterest’s Gitbook, underscoring the breadth and depth of Minterest’s technology and ensuring secure and smooth lending and borrowing operations.

Minterest Governance Token

The Minterest token contract remains unchanged, continuing to reward early supporters and liquidity providers. We’re planning a discussion with the community about the token’s future branding. Stay tuned!

Stable Tokenomics

Our tokenomics remain unchanged, honouring all vesting schedules established earlier this year. This includes the 50% proportional uplift provided to all early supporters. You can check out the details of the tokenomics here.

Empowering NFTs

Minterest NFTs will continue to serve their original purpose, providing key card access to the protocol and acting as emissions boost for liquidity providers.

And, if you’re an existing NFT holder, watch this space for some exciting news in a future post.

This is just the start. In the next post we’ll delve into the broader roadmap for 2023 and shine a spotlight on key product updates and plans towards public launch.

A “Community Asks” section has been set up on the Minterest Gitbook to address your questions. Our next update will share a roadmap for the remainder of 2023, offering insight into your key queries on topics including product highlights, Minterest NFTs, token vesting, supported token markets, DAO, and more.

We are also reopening the Minterest Telegram and Discord channels shortly and look ahead to resuming regular communication with the Minterest community.

Throughout this difficult period we have appreciated the messages of support. There is an incredible opportunity in front of us and we are excited to share it together.

Best regards,

The Minterest Team

Feb 28 to Mar 17, 2023

The final stage of Private Launch is live. That means money markets are growing, TVL is climbing – and the dev team is busy fixing bugs and adding new features ahead of public launch.

Here are some of the key updates in the roughly three weeks since the final stage went live.

• Integrated Gas Price Prediction 28.02.2023

Activated the gas price prediction feature to set the correct gas for swap/transfer transactions and to prevent transactions from hanging.

• Codebase Optimizations 02.03.2023

Integrated Manual Swap Manager into all inquisition services. Adjusted the codebases for increased efficiency.

• User Interface Add-ons 07.03.2023

Implemented several updates to the user interface. Added a button that enables easy access to available NFTs on OpenSea. Created a dedicated block to display total rewards, and included total supply/borrow values in the table headers.

• Bug Fixing Spree 09.03.2023

Fixed several bugs related to collateral and net APY display. Added helpful tooltips for staking and withdrawing. Temporarily hid some graphs until they can be fixed to ensure optimal user experience.

• Risk Endpoint Testing 16.03.2023

Introduced an API endpoint functionality that calculates the probability of default for a given portfolio using collateral and borrowing data. The tool enables monitoring the overall health of a selected portfolio by assessing the risk over the next three days.

Further Updates

Regular summaries of important updates will be posted here on the blog. For a https://minterest.com/blog/#buidl

Early participants noticed NFTs started appearing in their wallets on Monday, Feb. 27 as NFTs were minted and distributed and since access to Minterest from now till its public launch requires an NFT.

The first Minterest NFT sale happened shortly after for 1 ETH on the Monday on OpenSea.

Protocol Goes Live!

Last Tuesday afternoon, February 28, 2023, the Minterest protocol officially entered the last phase of its Private Launch. All core protocol functions went live including emission rewards,, with TVL pouring in right away.

$1,000,000 TVL Achieved

One day later, on March 1, Minterest attracted > $1,000,000 TVL. Users benefited greatly from the smaller pool of participants, with some markets reporting APYs over 3,000%!

Launch AMA Gains Hundreds of Listeners on Twitter Spaces

The Minterest team wrapped up the week with a truly epic Twitter Spaces, a freewheeling conversation with the management team of JR, Kyn, Veiko, Kevin, Martti and Denis. The event gained hundreds of  listeners over the course of an hour, and formed the capstone to a phenomenal first week.

Link to recording is here.

Week in Review

The end of the week saw a flurry of activity on OpenSea, with a growing number of NFT sales and a floor price currently sitting around 0.23 ETH.

The number of protocol users grew 60% over the week.

TVL exceeded $4,500,000 by the end of the first week, marking a highly significant achievement in such a short time

What’s Next?

All eyes start to look towards April as a potential date for the full public launch.

Next developments on the protocol include enabling auto-liquidations and the long-anticipated risk index – the first of its kind.

Minterest Launch FAQs

Excited to start using the protocol? Head over to OpenSea to grab an NFT for access.

Not sure where to start? Access the app here. You can also check out the Minterest FAQ on Gitbook, where you’ll find everything you need to know about:

• Accessing the protocol
• Supplying liquidity
• Borrowing assets
• Minterest NFTs
• Staking

Start with the FAQ, then head to the blog to learn more about the only DeFi protocol with sustainable real yield.

“Minteresting” Fun Facts

To whet your appetite, some Minterest fun facts from the first week:

TVL and Markets:

• First week TVL: $4.5 million+
• 2 markets $1M+ supply (wBTC & USDC)
• Whales swimming to Minterest:
  • Top 4 users provide greater than 50% supply,
  • Top 10 users provide greater than 90% supply
  • Top 3 borrowers account for roughly 50% total borrow
  • Top 10 borrowers account for 90% total borrow
• More than 60% of all users borrow
• More than 80% of available supply borrowed
• Current 20% borrow cap set to increase soon

NFT Sales

• 34 total sales
• 1 sale at 1.5 ETH – Level 5 “Sergey Nazarov”
• 2 sales at 1 ETH – Level 7  “Winklevoss Twins” & Level 7 “Roger Ver”
• 1 sale for 1 ETH – Level 8 “SBF” 

No one survived the crypto downturn unscathed. Noted CEXs failed, major NFT projects lost most of their value, and DeFi protocols collapsed.

Compound and Aave, in contrast, remain strong.

The two DeFi lending protocols have carved out a position as industry leaders, with $2.8 billion and $7 billion in TVL respectively. Together, they stand at the head of a DeFi sector poised for a potential rebound. 

If Compound and Aave represent the best of DeFi 1.0, what comes next? What are they doing right? And what will DeFi 2.0 do better?

In an ongoing series on the current state of DeFi (see part 1 here), this article describes how leading DeFi protocols are currently structured, and how Minterest and DeFi 2.0 aim to improve.

• DeFi Lending Protocols – Basic Structure
• DeFi 1.0 Value Creation
• DeFi’s True Value: Wealth-Building from Tokenized Assets
• Yield Farming Transitions to Real Yield
  • Current DeFi Challenges
  • Future-Focused User Benefits

DeFi Lending Protocols – Basic Structure

Compound and Aave both rely on similar principles. Users of each protocol fall into two general categories: liquidity users (borrowers) and liquidity providers (lenders). Aave and Compound create asset pools for various crypto tokens, and users add to and withdraw from those pools.

The premise is straightforward. All borrowing is collateralised, meaning no user can take out more than they have put in. The actual practice gets a bit more complicated; since users rarely lend one token and borrow the same token, protocols rely on token pairs, with asset pools for each pair.

DeFi 1.0 Value Creation

Why use a DeFi lending protocol? 

Access and inclusivity.

DeFi lending, as opposed to lending in traditional finance, reduces the friction of participation to anyone with a wallet, and provides absolute transparency to the inner workings of the protocol.

Permissionless – Anyone can participate. DeFi users don’t need to pass extensive financial scrutiny to participate. With sufficient collateral, whether it is Minterest, Aave, or Compound, users can simply connect a wallet and begin staking or borrowing.

Trustlessness – No one entity controls a user’s finances in DeFi. There is no loan approval and no extra hoops to jump through when supplying or withdrawing funds. Note that “trustlessness” does not mean “poor security.” For example, Compound touts “institutional” levels of reliability and safety. For its part, Minterest has undergone four security audits to date.

Liquidity

DeFi lending protocol participants gain access to liquidity, opening up a variety of use cases for both individuals and other ecosystem protocols. Borrowers utilize liquidity for several reasons.

Arbitrage. Arbitrage opportunities are aplenty across the market. The price of one asset may be higher or lower across different DEXs. A flashloan would allow a user to borrow that asset, swap the asset on the DEXs, make a tidy profit, and then pay back the loan all in one transaction. 

Trading Positions. Borrowing assets to gain exposure to an asset forlonging or shorting it is a widespread use case. For example, if a trader believes the price of BTC will drop, they can lend a stablecoin, borrow BTC, sell BTC at spot price, wait for the price to drop, purchase BTC again, pay back the loan, and pocket the difference.

Short-Term Loans. Purchasing real-world goods and services without selling the original assets is commonplace for groups, like Bitcoin miners. Bitcoin miners fund the expansion of their operations by using their BTC portfolio as collateral to borrow stablecoins to purchase new mining equipment. Why?

• Miners maintain exposure to the underlying asset
• Miners do not trigger taxable events for selling the underlying asset (depending on the jurisdiction, of course)

DeFi’s True Value: Wealth-Building from Tokenized Assets

All of the above benefits get to the beating heart of DeFi: providing advanced wealth-building tools for users. 

In DeFi 1.0, this took the form of yield farming. Demand for certain assets meant lenders on DeFi protocols could expect significant returns on their positions; rates of 20% APY were remarkable compared to TradFi savings interest rates of less than 1% but entirely unsustainable.

DeFi 1.0 quickly developed a yield farming problem. Investors earned sky-high returns built on the foundations of hyperinflationary tokenomics where tokens contained no underlying value. The unraveling of this flimsy structure came tumbling down during the crypto bear market, resulting in bank runs on protocols. Users withdrew and sold off their assets in droves as high-profile projects, like Terra, highlighted critical weaknesses in their designs.

Yield Farming Transitions to Real Yield

Despite high-profile failures, lending protocols functioned as they were designed to during the adverse market conditions, protecting lenders and borrowers where CeFi players did not due to their opaque walls and reliance on unwarranted trust from their users. In 2023, DeFi lending protocols are emerging as foundational layers for every major blockchain, as Aave and Compound have demonstrated. 

Aave and Compound, with significant TVL, collect fees from activities (borrowing, lending, flash loans) on the protocol. Both protocols feature a governance token, providing some limited utility for repaying fees.

The question for DeFi remains how to develop dependably attractive yields (thus attracting greater TVL) without relying on an inflationary model.

So where does DeFi go from here, and how can Minterest improve the existing model?

Current DeFi Challenges

Dysfunctional governance tokens. Both Aave and Compound feature governance tokens. Both tokens convey voting rights for their respective protocol. 

However, neither Aave nor Compound have made their tokens integral to the function of the protocol. The tokens do not derive any utility from the underlying lending and borrowing activities on these respective protocols, nor do the protocols derive value from the tokens outside of governance.

Predatory liquidations and outflow of fees. Protocol fees are generated from three areas: interest rate differential between lenders and borrowers, flash loans, and liquidations. Most of this value is parties who are not liquidity providers, even though the value is derived from them. Additionally, current DeFi lending protocols rely on third-party liquidators to remain solvent. Those liquidators are incentivized by collecting a portion of each loan liquidated, essentially a bounty for detecting under-collateralised positions on the protocol. And these liquidations siphon approx 50% of protocol value to themselves. What is clear is that there needs to be more alignment of incentives between liquidity providers and the protocols.

Future-Focused User Benefits

In both cases, DeFi 2.0 can build on the existing model to create additional value for users. Minterest is designed to do just this. 

Minterest captures more fees. Minterest captures more fees than others because it handles liquidations through its innovative auto-liquidation engine*. Thus, Minterest can capture those fees unlike other protocols where this value is lost to third parties.  

Minterest transfers all value back to users. Minterest captures all fee value and uses it to buy back its native token on-market through an automated Buyback engine. The token is then distributed back to users who participate proportionally in the protocol’s governance based on staking and voting in governance proposals.

MINTY is more than just a governance token. It’s a medium of value transfer, and the above benefits feed into the core function of the MINTY token. Minterest distributes the value it accrues from its various operations right back to the users of the protocol. The MINTY token is the medium by which this value is transferred back to participants, linking MINTY to the growth of the protocol’s TVL.. Such performance capabilities in a token are unique in the sector and form the bedrock of a new evolution of DeFi protocols.

Minterest provides Sustainable Real Yield. Minterest is designed to align the incentives of its core user, liquidity providers. Greater liquidity generates more significant fees, increasing the distribution of value back to these users. The results are fully sustainable yield farming for users and a DeFi revolution with the highest possible long-term APYs with the sector’s lowest borrow cost.

*Note that Minterest’s Autoliquidation Engine has been renamed to Solvency Engine.

Or put an old-fashioned way, what does this protocol offer its users?
One answer to that question is the idea of “real yield”, a topic that has generated increasing buzz in the crypto world. To understand what real yield is – and how Minterest provides real yield – you need to start with the current state of DeFi: where it is, what went wrong, and how DeFi 2.0 promises to improve.

• DeFi’s Untapped Potential
• DeFi: New Financial Model, Same Old Problems
  • Complexity
  • Centralization
  • Market Volatility
  • Fraud
  • Scalability/Sustainability
• Maturing Markets
• Finding Real Yield

DeFi’s Untapped Potential

DeFi (Decentralized Finance) refers to a growing ecosystem of financial applications built on blockchain technology that aim to provide financial services without the need for traditional intermediaries such as banks or financial institutions. The last crypto bull run saw easy money pumped into DeFi in vast quantities, fueled by the sector’s vast potential:

• Decentralized exchanges, for peer-to-peer trading of cryptocurrencies and other assets without the need for a centralized exchange.

• Lending and borrowing platforms, enabling users to earn interest on their assets or to borrow funds from others using smart contracts to manage the terms and conditions of the loans.

• Stablecoins, tying digital assets to a stable asset such as the US dollar, allowing for more stability in volatile crypto markets.

• Tokenization, converting traditional assets such as real estate or art into tokenized form and making it possible to trade those assets.

But in the rush to claim the vast wealth DeFi promised, new protocols started to take shortcuts. DeFi startups lured retail investors, flush with cash, by promising sky-high yields. Unsustainable yield farms grew in popularity, fueled by ever-greater demand.

What drew users in? Part of the allure was found in DeFi’s inherent advantages over TradFi. With DeFi, anyone could access advanced financial tools; borrowing and lending functions were no longer walled off behind staid financial institutions and vested interests.

DeFi held immense promise as an entirely new financial model. Unfortunately, in the rush to build a new model, DeFi began to repeat some of TradFi’s mistakes.

DeFi: New Financial Model, Same Old Problems

The early wave of DeFi protocols – DeFi 1.0 – eventually developed a set of core problems that were exposed dramatically during the crypto crash of 2022.

Complexity

Many DeFi platforms were difficult for average users to understand, leading to potential security risks and difficulties in accessing the platform.

Centralization

Despite being marketed as decentralized, many DeFi platforms were highly centralized and controlled by a small group of individuals, undermining the decentralized nature of DeFi and leaving it open to manipulation.

Market Volatility

DeFi proved highly susceptible to market volatility with dramatic and rapid price changes. As ETH went, so did the market; at its peak, the Ethereum blockchain was responsible for nearly 97% of DeFi TVL. That market share has since decreased to around 60% as more players have entered the DeFi space, providing some much-needed flexibility.

Fraud

Ponzi schemes abounded in DeFi 1.0, as bad actors took advantage of the hype and capitalized on DeFi’s unknowns. This was the case for many protocols that only produced high yields by relying on a steady stream of fresh liquidity, primarily from retail investors.

Scalability/Sustainability

DeFi 1.0 largely rode the wave of the crypto bull market, foregoing long-term development in favor of short-term gains. 

The bear market forced a reckoning. Fraudsters were exposed, poor business practices came to light, and major players in the sector (3AC, Celsius, FTX, etc.) collapsed.

Maturing Markets

In the aftermath, a new vision for DeFi emerged. Despite DeFi 1.0’s problems, it served as a clear proof-of-concept. The market wanted DeFi exchanges, borrowing and lending protocols, tokenization, etc. The underlying use cases were sound, even if numerous protocols didn’t hold up.

In fact, DeFi 1.0, and the resulting crash, bears strong similarities to an earlier tech market cycle: the dot-com bubble of the late 90s and early 2000s.

Note this comparison of the two:

Dot-com companies crashed – hard – in the early 2000s. In fact, value just after the initial crash rested at a level not much higher than before the boom took off. On the surface, dot-coms seemed to be right back where they started a few years before.

Zoom out, and a vastly different story emerges.

When the dot-com bubble burst, two things happened:

1. Companies with poor underlying fundamentals failed.
2. The underlying technology grew.

Why? Because there was genuine underlying value in the technology – just not in most of the applications. 

DeFi 2.0 finds itself in the same position.

There’s a renewed emphasis on sustainability and profitability. With the hype largely gone from the market, investors can evaluate projects more clearly.

On the project side, new DeFi protocols need to deliver clear value based on rock-solid industry fundamentals. And in typical crypto fashion, this search for underlying value has led to a new term: real yield.

Finding Real Yield

Real yield implies sustainability and value. Gone are the sky-high yields of Anchor Protocol and a yield-farming model built on attracting an endless stream of new investors. DeFi 2.0 relies on real yield, returns based on protocols that meet proven use cases and have a clear path to profitability.

DeFi 2.0 also involves a return to the core principles that set DeFi apart from traditional finance, including:

• Decentralization

• Accessibility

• Trust

• Reduced costs

• Speed

Minterest leads the charge towards DeFi 2.0, building a protocol with solid fundamentals to create genuine underlying value. It’s that value that powers real yield in a way that DeFi 1.0 never did.

How does it work? Read the whitepaper here, or watch a breakdown of how Minterest outcompetes other protocols.

Next up: What Works (And What Doesn’t) In DeFi: How current DeFi protocols generate value.

Tokenomics Jan 2023

The year finished with a flurry of activity, including revisions of Minterest’s tokenomics. All together, it’s no surprise the Minterest team has poured more than 50,000 hours into the project since inception, with Minterest now the most extensive, most secure code base ever conceived in DeFi.

So, what went down last year exactly? Here is a selection of key milestones in 2022.

Early 2022: Planning to launch

As 2022 began, Minterest was in the middle of community-focused fundraising events. The Community Allocation Event (CAE) took place in late January, and allowed supporters to secure MINTY token allocations up to 500 USDC at the lowest price in the upcoming Liquidity Bootstrapping Pool (LBP).

That event was quickly followed by the LBP, which in February raised over $5.5 million to support continued bootstrapping of the protocol. Together, the CAE and LBP provided crucial early support for the protocol and established an ever larger base of supporters.

Early-to-mid 2022: Major market shift

In late February, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine played into emerging macro-economic factors, which together saw market sentiment decline significantly. Hindsight showed the broader crypto market cap had peaked in November 2021 and by early April 2022 was beginning to face stiff headwinds.

Minterest planned to launch on Moonbeam, but increasing instability in the sector combined with Ethereum’s continued DeFi dominance, caused the switch to Ethereum in April 2022, a critical strategic decision. It resulted in extensive unforeseen development work, but the decision has been applauded ever since. 

In May, the crypto crash, aka the Do Kwon Krash, began with the infamous Terra/Luna implosion. The algorithmic Terra USD stablecoin lost its peg and Luna’s value plummeted from over $100 to mere fractions of a cent. 

What no one saw coming was the brewing macroeconomic negativity that turned Luna’s implosion into a match which ignited crypto’s sector-wide collapse. 

Minterest did not sit idly by during these events. A constant stream of information came from key players with regular AMAs and community discussions held on Discord and social media to keep supporters informed.

Minterest responded rigorously to the changing market conditions. First and foremost, that meant reappraising not just the launch schedule but the overall protocol product strategy. Doing so protected the interests of all token holders investors while ensuring the protocol’s best chance of success.

A snapshot of fundamental improvements the team worked over the year include:

• Revised token emissions structure and tokenomics 

• A new, highly sophisticated feature suite 

• Extensive additional auto-liquidation developments 

• Brand-new, DeFi first UX and UI features

The team also unrolled Lock & Load, a key opportunity to reward early supporters who participated in the CAE and LBP events at the start of the year. Lock & Load was a unique chance for such supporters to double their MINTY token allocation in return for locking up their MINTY for a year and vesting them over the following 12 months. The offer was hugely successful, with over 600,000 tokens or more than 50% of eligible participants taking it up.

2022 into 2023: Building a better DeFi

Where does that leave Minterest today?

• Key token markets deployed

• Whitelisted access to key features for product testing

• Lock & Load concluded in December, with over 50% acceptance for eligible tokens

• 4th security audit completed

• 5th security audit on the way

• Full functionality rollout and NFT access early 2023

• Public launch early in 2023

Despite the carnage of the broader crypto market, Minterest has never panicked. The bear market has separated, and continues to do so, the good from the bad, with the opportunity now open for new projects with strong fundamentals to emerge and stake a claim for dominance as the cycle resets.

DeFi is evolving. Its new reality means hyper-inflationary token emissions are no more. This has allowed sound, sustainable projects to now develop and flourish, which will be the building block of the next generation of DeFi, with Minterest leading the way.

Minterest. Yield gets real.

If you are a Minterest CAE and LBP participant, and you have an MINTY allocation, you can log into app.minterest.com and opt-in to the Lock & Load offer.

To learn more about the Lock & Load, head over to the terms & conditions.

Lock into Minterest, get loaded with MINTY.

To that end, we’ve made adjustments in the features and token economy of the Minterest protocol, and with it a corresponding revised whitepaper. The current DeFi ecosystem emphasises strong fundamentals and sustainability, and we believe Minterest excels at both. This blogpost explains in summary some of the changes that have been made.

DeFi’s New Reality

During the 2021 bull run, liquidity providers maximised yields using DeFi models with unsustainable inflationary emission rewards. Such projects’ high yields attracted tens of billions of dollars in liquidity. Super-returns became the ‘new normal’, fuelling even further boom-market speculation.

What happened next? Terra Network collapsed, markets followed suit, and the contagion of counterparty risk evaporated capital, adding fuel to the inferno of bankruptcies and insolvencies across the sector. 

The super-yield party was over. The resulting hangover from unsustainable, hyper-inflationary models caused liquidity providers to fundamentally reassess how they deployed capital.

Minterest’s Revised Tokenomics

The revision of Minterest’s tokenomics takes full advantage of DeFi’s new environment.

• Circulating supply is highly disciplined, on-market supply even more so.

• For project supporters, other than LBP participants, MINTY is locked for 12 months prior to 12 month vesting.

• All emission rewards vest over 12 months.

• Standard emission rewards are markedly reduced; only one-third of previous rewards, better reflecting DeFi’s new reality.

• Governance rewards emissions are maintained, strongly favouring staking and governance participation andincentivising long-term holding.

• A new Strategic Reserve accumulates MINTY from buyback processes, supporting on-market scarcity and MINTY demand.

Disciplined tokenomics that constrict supply powerfully support the protocol’s token economy. The new tokenomics protect Minterest from likely  worsening macroeconomic headwinds while allowing the protocol to successfully attract long term TVL despite such conditions. 

Finally, Minterest’s tokenomics achieve something else. Standard emissions that vest over 15 years and the Strategic Reserve enable the protocol to become fully self-sustaining.

Minterest Circulating Supply Comparison

What’s Next?

This Whitepaper Update is the tip of the iceberg. Detailed tokenomics analysis will follow, then protocol Private Launch, NFTs, an offer specific to LBP participants (including the CAE), the roadmap to full public access, new branding and interface design, plus much more.

Stay tuned and watch this space for more information! 

Welcome to Minterest – seriously DeFi.

• Celsius, a crypto lender with $20 billion worth of assets under management, was recently forced to freeze customer withdrawals. 

• BlockFi, one of the top 5 largest crypto lenders, was essentially bailed out by FTX with a deal that provided a $400M line of credit.

• Voyager filed for bankruptcy protection blaming a crypto market crash that caused it to freeze customer withdrawals. Just like Celsius and BlockFi, Voyager is also one of the largest crypto lenders with $5.9 billion in crypto assets at the time of its bankruptcy filing.

Voyager went one step further advertising blatantly that customers’ funds held by Voyager are FDIC insured. The FDIC issued a cease-and-desist statement to Voyager because of the false claims that its customers would have government protections.

However, those were the centralised finance institutions (CeFi) with no transparency on the usage of customer funds. They went silent, but DeFi is working 24×7.

Decentralised Finance worked well, and protocols like Aave, Compound, MakerDAO – all functioned flawlessly 24×7. DeFi allows customers to monitor the protocols on the blockchain. CeFi institutions rely on vague promises and false claims, with little to no transparency.

The collapse of the major CeFi institutions can largely be attributed to the fact that they did business with counterparties (the likes of 3AC) that went either insolvent or bankrupt. However, The troubled CeFi institutions were forced to pay back the outstanding loans on DeFi protocols first, as the rules were enforced by smart contracts that are fully transparent and don’t rely on counterparties for settlement.

Celsius was forced to pay down its $400M DeFi loans on Maker, Aave, and Compound to prevent its collateral from being liquidated. The over-collateralization in DeFi protects the solvency of the protocol and customers’ funds. 

These unfortunate series of events during Q2 2022 have proved that core pillars of DeFi, like lending and AMMs function as intended with foundations that are rock solid and fully transparent. 

DeFi is the financial backbone for the entire economic ecosystem built on blockchain, both for retail and institutions. DeFi lending protocols rely on over-collateralization with far better risk management to secure the lenders’ funds in case of an unforeseen scenario where chances of a default are higher. 

We see lending and borrowing in DeFi becoming the ultimate gateway to crypto for retail and institutions that are looking to grow their capital in a secure and sustainable way with full transparency. 

Bear markets are part of the market cycles. History tells us that bear markets drive innovation where the sidelined capital flows towards high quality projects that focus on long-term sustainability. At Minterest Labs, we started #BUIDLing in September 2020 and have achieved numerous technical milestones since then, including a highly sophisticated risk probability engine enabling users to mitigate their portfolio’s liquidation risk and significant improvements in the product design inspired by the elegant design of the Porsche 911 GT3 dashboard. We are now targeting an early Q4 2022 launch date with updated tokenomics.

DeFi will rise and shine because of the sheer nature of true decentralisation where you don’t need to trust a counterparty who is incentivized to twist the truth. The rules are enforced by smart contracts, providing visibility and transparency on every transaction that brings accountability.

We can’t deny the volatile market conditions that rocked the crypto market recently. In all long-term market cycles, you will see booms and busts but eventually, companies with strong fundamentals and network effects survive and emerge stronger than ever.

To remind you about how far we’ve come, we have put together a #BUIDL week to showcase the great strides we have made and how we continue to create and deliver a best-in-class DeFi experience with long-term sustainable growth.

Why MINTY is built for long-term sustainability

Minterest aims to deliver a product that will sustainably serve the market by delivering the highest long-term yield in DeFi. We achieve this by:   

• Leveraging the flywheel effect, where all the surplus generated by the protocol is used for the buyback process and then distributed back to the protocol participants.
• Auto-liquidations* done by the protocol to capture liquidation fees. 
• The token emissions mechanism is designed to incentivise protocol participants which brings a higher degree of capital efficiency.

What have we achieved in Q1 2022

We started #BUIDLing nearly 20 months ago and have achieved numerous milestones since then. During the process, we learned that flexibility and adaptability are key attributes when it comes to delivering a great product. We listened to both our community and the market to gather important information and feedback to improve our product.

What Minterest accomplished in Q1 2022: 

• We successfully closed a Community Allocation Event (CAE) and a Liquidity Bootstrapping Pool (LBP) event. 

The CAE attracted over 20,000 subscribers in just the first week and the LBP event raised $5.52 million on Copper for the protocol treasury. 

The CAE and LBP events revealed a high level of support from both our community and institutions. 

• Launch on Ethereum.

Following the highly successful LBP, Minterest received significant market feedback expressing support for the proposition to prioritise Ethereum for its initial launch phase, with Moonbeam and other EVM-compatible networks coming later. 

If you want to learn more about why we chose Ethereum as our first blockchain, check out this article. 

• Two successful security audits.

Minterest views security as its top priority, which is why we have hired several top-level security companies to review our entire development process. We commissioned Trail of Bits and Hacken to ensure that our code meets the most stringent standards of code security.

Trail of Bits audited Minterest’s smart contracts across several categories for technical and economic review, namely:

• Access Controls 
• Auditing and Logging 
• Authentication 
• Configuration 
• Cryptography 
• Data Exposure 
• Data Validation
• Denial of Service 
• Error Reporting
• Patching 
• Session Management
• Testing
• Timing 
• Undefined Behaviour.

After initial feedback from Trail of Bits, Minterest implemented the fixes and mitigations they suggested, and the protocol was given a thumbs up. 

If you want to learn more about how Minterest fared in the audit, check out Trail of Bits’ audit report. 

Hacken security audit used the following methodologies, focused on smart contract code review and security analysis for commonly known vulnerabilities:

• Architecture Review
• Functional Testing
• Computer-Aided Verification
• Manual Review.

In the initial audit, security engineers found 2 high, 4 medium, and 4 low-severity issues. These issues were quickly resolved by the team during the second audit. The security score after the second audit was 10 out of 10.

If you want to learn more about how Minterest fared in the audit, check out the Hacken audit report.

• Minterest Beta launch.

The beta launch was split into two phases, namely:

1. Phase one – Internal access went live on 9th of May 2022. This first phase is only accessible to the internal team.
   
2. Phase two –  In phase 2, the protocol will be available with limited functionality to early-stage supporters. The dates for the second phase will be announced when all the testing has been completed.

The beta launch allows the protocol’s functionality to be technically and economically stress-tested in a safe environment before launching publicly. 

If you want to learn more about Minterest’s beta launch, check out this article.

Minterest Development: Behind The Scenes

Aside from the most significant milestones that we have achieved during Q1 2022, the Minterest development team has been busy optimising smart contracts and adding new functionalities to the protocol, while at the same time, improving the UI and UX to deliver a seamless customer experience. 

• Improvements in Smart Contracts

A new set of features were added to the smart contract; they were needed for the stable growth of the total value locked (TVL). One of those features is ‘Business Development’ which is meant to incentivise business developers to find and bring liquidity providers and reward them for participation in the protocol functions. 

We’ve built an extensive Gatekeeping module to keep the protocol safe, but still have it as decentralised as possible. 

We have also developed sophisticated NFT and Booster systems to track the reward boosting for our users.  We also completed the on-chain part of our liquidation engine. This piece of software is backed with extensive mathematical and modelling work which contains non-trivial logic, as automated liquidations have never been done before in DeFi.

• Minterest dashboard and risk assessment tools

We understand that users want to take leveraged loans without excessive liquidation risk.  

This is why we implemented features such as notifications, collateral ratio gauge, liquidation risk gauge, as well as the portfolio back-test risk analysis feature. 

• The production version of the Minterest UI

We tested on many target audiences and launched a production version of our UI. The application is not only loaded with data, but it’s also user-friendly, thanks to our Indexer – a special service that scrapes data from chains and displays it to the web pages of each user. 

• The successful architectural design of Guardians. 

We have designed the inner workings of several Guardians – the web services that will support the Minterest protocol. Some examples include the Liquidation Guardian for off-chain calculations of liquidation, and the Restaker Guardian that keeps users’ weight up-to-date in Buyback- to optimise their earnings. These services are not yet in development, but the architecture design and polishing of details are ongoing.

We Continue #BUIDLing

With the first quarter behind us, here’s what you can look forward to. We are focusing our efforts on UI and UX – i.e., new wallets, scrapping more data, showing more charts, sending messages through Telegram and emails, and building the Risk Management tool. We are also planning to build the Guardians, with the primary ones being the Liquidator and Restaker Guardians. Each Guardian is a big sub-project that involves developers, designers, mathematicians, and many other specialists in our team.

Closing Thoughts

With much of the groundwork being done, we are now close to delivering a product that we can all be immensely proud of. We are delighted to have reached this stage of development and we couldn’t have done it without the support of our amazing Minterest community.

Keep Calm and Carry on #BUIDLing.

*Note that Minterest’s Autoliquidation Engine has been renamed to Solvency Engine.

• Head over to Twitter this Wednesday/Thursday
• Post your question (only one question per user) on Twitter. Make sure to use the #MINTERESTFAQ and #ASKKYN tags, so we can spot your questions and pick the winners
• Join us on Twitter Spaces this Friday to get the results. The best community question wins a Minterest Next Level NFT and gets a chance to be included in Minterest’s FAQ section

You can check the Minterest whitepaper and blog to generate your questions.

Twitter Spaces Friday

Minterest’s popular COO, Kyn Chaturvedi will be selecting the best questions from those left under the Twitter post. Winners will be announced during Twitter Spaces this Friday. The winners of the Next Level NFT will be chosen from:

• General Channel Tweets. The best question wins Minterest Next Level NFT
• SenMin Channel Activity. The best rephrasing of an answer from Friday’s SenMin Party wins Minterest Next Level NFT
• Live Q&A during the Twitter Spaces. The best live question wins Minterest Next Level NFT

All your questions have a chance to be officially listed in Minterest’s FAQ section.

Join us on Twitter Spaces this Friday and let the questions begin!

What is Minterest?

Minterest is a unique borrowing/lending protocol built by industry leaders to service the billions in Total Value Locked (TVL), in DeFi lending projects, with the specific aim of putting user benefits at its core. It provides users with a decentralised financial platform that is fair and inclusive.

The Minterest protocol has the world’s first buyback mechanism, which automatically passes on surpluses to participating platform users. This way, users get protocol rewards on top of industry leading borrowing/lending rates, creating the potential for the highest long-term yields in DeFi. The protocol also has an on-chain treasury which captures and passes on liquidation surpluses to users.

Learn more about core protocol functions such as utilisation limit, utilisation ratio, and auto-liquidation in our whitepaper.

Liquidation is one of the significant risks of leverage in any position, at the time of borrowing. Due to the volatility of many cryptocurrencies, liquidations occur regularly in DeFi. 

That’s why the Minterest protocol offers risk analysis tools; they ensure users have more insight over their positions.

Risk Analysis Tools Walk-through

The Minterest Labs team is working to build the best lending/borrowing platform in the DeFi space. Part of this involves a Portfolio Dashboard to give users a clear overview of their positions on Minterest. Even though the dashboard has many attributes, we will focus on three main risk assessment features our users can access.

Feature #1: Notifications

Users want to make the most of a DeFi protocol, taking leveraged loans without excessive risk of being liquidated. The main reason behind any liquidation is a lack of sufficient collateral, which happens when users don’t pay enough attention to their collateral ratio. However, with notifications, users can more easily be aware of any changes in their risk profile due to market movements.

The Minterest notifications feature is designed to help users reduce the risk of being liquidated while also saving them time. In addition, notifications can remind users when they need to participate in protocol governance. Users can set notification alerts in two ways — via e-mail or Telegram. Custom notifications will let them stay ahead of the game whenever their attention is required. 

Imagine if a user set up a Liquidation Risk Alert and their risk on collateral changed significantly. Timely notification would allow them to increase their collateral ratio to avoid liquidation or take other reasonable steps to preserve capital.

Feature #2: Collateral Ratio Gauge

The Collateral Ratio Gauge feature is like a forward-looking radar that estimates the collateral ratio that will result if the user takes a lend or borrow action, before they take that action. For example, if a user wants to open a position but the challenge is that they don’t know how a new position will impact their portfolio. Instead of taking chances, they can use the collateral ratio gauge tool before making a decision. It will display how their collateral ratio may change depending on the position they want to open.

Feature #3: Liquidation Risk Gauge

The Liquidation Risk Gauge is another feature, it works like a forward-looking radar, an index estimating the probability that a user will have a liquidation event over the course of the next year. The Liquidation Risk Gauge is based on the user’s current portfolio, using the prior year’s market movement data for the assets utilised, to calculate the probability for a potential liquidation event in the user’s portfolio. The user can see this Risk Gauge before they take any lend or borrow action, helping them to “look forward” and anticipate how their portfolio could be impacted by typical market movements.

Feature #4: Portfolio Back-test Risk Analysis

Using a Portfolio Back-test methodology, Minterest users will also be able to see how their current portfolio would have fared through the market movements of the past year, giving a useful indication of how it might fare in the coming year, helping users to make solid and informed decisions. Historical back-test portfolio analysis is a unique feature not available elsewhere in DeFi.

Join our Twitter Spaces on Friday, Apr 22 with our CPO David Esser to learn more about our risk analysis tools.

About Minterest

Minterest is a unique borrowing/lending protocol built by industry leaders to service the billions in Total Value Locked (TVL), in DeFi lending projects, with the specific aim of putting user benefits at its core. It provides users with a decentralised financial platform that is fair and inclusive.

The Minterest protocol has the world’s first buyback mechanism, which automatically passes on surpluses to participating platform users. This way, users get protocol rewards on top of industry leading borrowing/lending rates, creating the potential for the highest long-term yields in DeFi. The protocol also has an on-chain treasury which captures and passes on liquidation surpluses to users.

Looking for reasons to join the Senior Mintrepreneurs Club? Check out our detailed blog post to learn about all the benefits Minterest’s inner circle enjoys.

Quiz #1 Results

Quiz #1 was officially launched on April 4 and our community had a chance to participate until 10:00 PM UTC on April 6. 

The results are out! Please check your emails and Discord level. If you’re not on our Discord already, please join here. 

If you didn’t receive an email or a discord message, don’t get discouraged, these contests are just a stepping stone to help you learn more about the Minterest protocol. You can still take Quiz #2 and #3 to get special tags on the Minterest public Discord channel. 

If you missed the mark on this one, you’ll have the opportunity to enter many more in the future, including the upcoming Community Education Event. 

Next Steps Towards Becoming a Senior Mintrepreneur

We hope that you enjoyed participating! If you received an email, you’re officially 1/3 of your way to joining our exclusive Discord channel. Don’t forget to take Quiz #2 on Thursday and Quiz #3 next Monday, to get early access to Minterest merch, news, special events and NFT drops.

Join the quiz and answer questions to get the tag. The Tags are awarded to everyone who gets more than 80% of the questions correct.

More details about the tags and OG roles in the Minterest Discord channels will be shared later.

Who Can Access The Exclusive Senior Mintrepreneurs Channel?

You’ll be invited to the Senior Mintrepreneurs Discord Channel if:

We can’t wait to release all the big news, our fresh batch of merch and more with our Mintrepreneurs!

The Minterest protocol recently concluded a $5.52M LBP token allocation event on Copper. Although the event was mainly designed for large participant, smaller participants also suppored the LBP. This article will help you find answers to the most frequently asked questions related to the Minterest LBP token event.

This article will help you find answers to the most frequently asked questions related to the Minterest LBP token event. 

Where can I track my investment and NFT level?

You can use the Minterest LBP dashboard to track your investment and NFT level. You can connect your Metamask wallet on the dashboard to see how many MINTY tokens you have, their total value, and your current NFT level.

Did I win a Next Level NFT during the LBP?

To check whether you have won an NFT, you can go to the Minterest LBP dashboardand connect your Metamask wallet. Your NFT level will be displayed under ‘Your Status’ window on the right hand side of the screen.

NFTs were allocated during the LBP event depending on how much each participant contributed. Your NFT level depends on your position relative to other LBP participants on the leaderboard.

When and where will I receive my NFT?

All the NFTs will be released after the TGE by the end of Q1 2022 during the private launch of the protocol. The Minterest NFT collection will also be tradeable on NFTrade, the upcoming multi-chain NFT marketplace on Moonbeam. More information about the Minterest and NFTrade collaboration can be found here.

AMA/Telegram/Discord/Twitter

If you win an NFT during an AMA or on social media, you will receive all further instructions on how to obtain your NFT. We will never ask you to transfer funds, nor will we ask you for private information such as your Metamask wallet password or seed phrase.

You can track the NFT Lottery winners here: Results of the Minterest NFT Lottery And Goodies Giveaway

LBP participation

If you won an NFT during the LBP, you don’t have to take any further actions. The NFT will automatically be transferred to your Metamask wallet on the Moonbeam network during the Token Generation Event in Q1 2022. 

When will the private launch of the Minterest Protocol take place?

Minterest protocol will be launched by the end of Q1 2022. The exact date will be announced a little later on our Twitter, Telegram, and Discord. 

Once again, we wish to thank and congratulate all CAE and LBP participants, supporters, and community members. We couldn’t have done this without you!
We are looking forward to what the future has in store for Minterest.

About Minterest

Minterest is a unique borrowing/lending protocol built by industry leaders to service the billions in Total Value Locked (TVL), in DeFi lending projects, with the specific aim of putting user benefits at its core. It provides users with a decentralised financial platform that is fair and inclusive.

The Minterest protocol has the world’s first buyback mechanism, which automatically passes on surpluses to contributing platform users. This way, users get protocol rewards on top of industry leading borrowing/lending rates, creating the potential for the highest long-term yields in DeFi. The protocol also has an on-chain treasury which captures and shares liquidation surpluses with users.

You can also track the NFT Lottery winners here: Results of the Minterest NFT Lottery And Goodies Giveaway

When will I receive the NFT I won participating in Telegram/Discord/Twitter or an AMA?

Those that have won an NFT through an AMA, Telegram, Discord, or Twitter, will be notified by Minterest team members. Make sure that you have provided your Telegram and Twitter handles, as well as your email address as per the instructions.

Your NFT reward will be airdropped at the time of TGE to your MetaMask wallet on the Moonbeam network.

When and where will Minterest launch?

Minterest is expected to have a private launch soon by the end of Q1 2022.

Once again, we wish to thank and congratulate all CAE and LBP participants, supporters, and community members. We couldn’t have done this without you!
We are looking forward to what the future has in store for Minterest.

About Minterest

Minterest is a unique borrowing/lending protocol built by industry leaders to service the billions in Total Value Locked (TVL), in DeFi lending projects, with the specific aim of putting user benefits at its core. It provides users with a decentralised financial platform that is fair and inclusive.

The Minterest protocol has the world’s first buyback mechanism, which automatically passes on surpluses to contributing platform users. This way, users receive protocol rewards on top of industry leading borrowing/lending rates, creating the potential for the highest long-term yields in DeFi. The protocol also has an on-chain treasury which captures and shares liquidation surpluses with users

• Minterest LBP Token Event
• How to participate?
  • Set up your wallet
  • Get ETH and ERC20 USDC
  • Connect your wallet
  • Participate in the LBP token event
    • Approve USDC usage
    • Acquire MINTY
    • Minterest dashboard for a user-friendly experience

We created a user-friendly Minterest dashboard for a simple and transparent experience to track investment, NFT level, and the real-time changes in the price.

Minterest is a ground-breaking lending protocol built by industry leaders to challenge existing DeFi incumbents and service billions in liquidity by providing its users the highest long-term yield in DeFi.

The Minterest protocol introduces DeFi 2.0; bringing more capital efficiency that allows users to access decentralised token money markets and passes on 100% of the rewards generated to its community of active participants.

The Minterest protocol will be launching it’s only public offering starting from 8th of February 2022 – the LBP token event on Copper. The process of participating in the Minterest LBP token event is explained in this short guide.

Before we proceed, please check out these resources to learn more about our LBP token event:

• Why are we launching an LBP token event?
• Reasons to participate in the Minterest LBP token event

UPDATE: MINTY tokens acquired through the LBP are the only ones without a lockup. All other parties are subject to a minimum block by block vesting of 1 year, making the LBP participants the only ones able to participate in MINTY or LP staking.

Minterest LBP Token Event

The Minterest LBP token event is the first public offering of MINTY tokens, and the only opportunity for the community to secure an allocation in the public offering prior to product launch.

The LBP on Copper is set up with the following metrics:

Where: Minterest.com
LBP Pools: Copper
Start: 08th of February 2022 – 2 pm GMT
End: 10th of February 2022 – 2 pm GMT
MINTY Max Supply: 2,500,000 MINTY (2.5% total supply)
LBP Base Pair: USDC/MINTY
Initial MINTY liquidity provided: 2,500,000 MINTY
Initial USDC liquidity provided: 300,000 USDC
LBP Weights: Starting at 98/2 and will gradually adjust to 50/50
LBP Starting price: 5.88 USDC

For more information, please visit Copper.

How to participate?

1. Set up your wallet

If this is your first time participating in an LBP on Copper, the first thing you need is to set up an Ethereum wallet. Copper supports two popular Ethereum wallets: MetaMask and Gnosis. For the purpose of this guide, we will be using the popular MetaMask wallet.

MetaMask wallet can be used as a browser extension, or it can be downloaded as a mobile wallet on both Android or iOS. However, in order to participate in the LBP on Copper, you’ll need a browser extension that you can download from here.

2. Get ETH and ERC20 USDC

To participate in the LBP token event, you will need ERC20 USDC tokens to exchange for MINTY, and ETH to fund the gas fee for the transaction. Please use your preferred CEX or DEX to acquire USDC and ETH. You can acquire both on major exchanges such as Binance, Coinbase, FTX, or Kucoin etc, and transfer them to the MetaMask wallet you just created. It is recommended to do this step in advance as some CEXes process the first withdrawal within 12-48 hours.

Please make sure you have some ETH in your MetaMask wallet to fund the gas fees on the network and avoid failed transactions due to insufficient funds. To estimate the gas fees for a token swap, please have a look at the swap fees for Uniswap here. You should always have slightly more ETH in your wallet (more than your estimate) because the gas fees depend on network congestion and the smart contract you’re interacting with.

3. Connect your wallet

Once you have ETH and USDC ready in your MetaMask wallet, go to Copper and select ‘Connect Wallet’ from the top right corner and choose MetaMask.

Note: Minterest or Copper will never ask for your private key or seed phrase.

4. Participate in the LBP token event

When the MetaMask wallet is successfully connected, you can participate in the LBP.

Note: Please keep in mind that trading ERC20 tokens (such as USDC or MINTY) on Copper requires two separate transactions: In the first transaction, you give Copper approval to withdraw USDC from your wallet and the actual swap happens in the second transaction.

4.1 Approve USDC usage

To approve the usage of USDC, simply click on ‘Approve USDC usage’ and the MetaMask browser extension will ask for the permission to confirm the approval request transaction. This approval transaction (once completed) will incur a small amount of gas fees depending on the network congestion at the time (anywhere between $10 – $20).

4.2 Acquire MINTY

Once the approval request for the usage of USDC by the pool contract is completed, you can input the amount of USDC you would like to swap into the field and Copper will estimate the amount of MINTY tokens you will receive.

Please note that the value of MINTY can change quickly during the LBP and is reflected real-time on the chart and in the input field box.

Read more about the LBP mechanics here.

If you wish to proceed with the token allocation, click on ‘Get MINTY’ and your MetaMask browser wallet will ask for confirmation along with the estimated gas fees for the swap transaction. After you confirm the transaction, you’ll see a success message on the screen.

After the success message, the transaction will be available under the ‘History’ tab of the event, and you’ll be able to see your current MINTY balance in the swap window.

To learn more about the Minterest LBP token event, join our dedicated Discord channel where we publish regular updates.

4.3 Minterest dashboard for a user-friendly experience

LBP participants will have access to a user-friendly Minterest dashboard for a simple and transparent experience, hosting an overview and a leaderboard detailing live the USDC spent by various participants in the LBP. They can also track their invested amount and NFT level, along with the real-time changes in the price.

Access the dashboard here.

What is Minterest?

Minterest is a decentralised lending protocol. It comes with a unique economic model where the protocol itself captures 100% of the value it creates from interest income, flash loan fees, and auto-liquidation fees which it distributes to its users in return for their active participation in governance.

• The winners of Minterest’s CAE “Thank You” Lottery week
• The NFT APY Boost Lottery Winners
• CAE and LBP Quiz Winners
• Christmas NFT Giveaway

Congratulations to all winners!

A few weeks ago we announced to you that we are postponing the Minterest Community Allocation Event (CAE). All CAE participants from the Minterest community spent time, effort, and capital so it is only fair that we thank you in return.

All the supporters who successfully deposited their funds in our previous CAE earned an extra 5 NFT “APY Boost” lottery tickets. Our team went live on Telegram every day from 13th to 18th of December and randomly picked the winning four names and described the NFTs that will be awarded.

Here are the winners of Minterest’s CAE “Thank You” Lottery week, which ran from 13th to 18th of December.

Winners will automatically receive the respective NFTs in their Whitelisted wallets after Minterest launches.

NFT APY Boost Lottery Winners

Below are the NFT APY Boost lottery winners announced on Feb 15th 2022

Below are the NFT APY Boost lottery winners announced on Feb 16th 2022

Below are the NFT APY Boost lottery winners announced on Feb 17th 2022

Below are the NFT APY Boost lottery winners announced on Feb 18th 2022

CAE and LBP Quiz Winners

Below are the CAE quiz winners

Below are the LBP quiz winners

Christmas NFT Giveaway

Below are the NFT Giveaway winners announced on Dec 22nd 2022

About Minterest

Minterest is a unique borrowing/lending protocol built by industry leaders to service the billions in Total Value Locked (TVL), in DeFi lending projects, with the specific aim of putting user benefits at its core. It provides users with a decentralised financial platform that is fair and inclusive.

The Minterest protocol has the world’s first buyback mechanism, which automatically passes on surpluses to contributing platform users. This way, users receive protocol rewards on top of industry leading borrowing/lending rates, creating the potential for the highest long-term yields in DeFi. The protocol also has an on-chain treasury which captures and shares liquidation surpluses with users.

• Introducing the most revenue efficient protocol and its architecture
• Benefits of a DeFi 2.0 Genesis Investor
• LBP – Frequently asked questions

Introducing the most revenue efficient protocol and its architecture

The Minterest protocol is up to 200% more capital efficient than the traditional top 3 DeFi lending solutions like Aave or Compound, while being just as secure. The protocol accomplishes this with two industry-first R&D innovations:

• The on-chain Buyback: A treasury algorithm passing all protocol surplus to protocol users instead of the traditional 10-15%, maximizing Minterest user APY drastically.
• The on-chain Liquidation Engine*: Up to 40% of protocol value is traditionally lost to liquidations because of 3rd parties conducting them off-chain. Minterest executes liquidations on-chain and captures all liquidation fees lost by other protocols, keeping hundreds of millions USD on-chain, increasing user APY.

If you want to learn more about the current and upcoming Minterest innovations, make sure to visit Minterest Docs, the Technology Paper, and our Discord.

Benefits of a DeFi 2.0 Genesis Investor

The LBP is the first public opportunity to invest, the first step in the protocol token launch. LBP Participants can expect an extraordinary APY in the high end of 3-figure and beyond based on 5 key factors:

1. Minterest token value potential
2. Receive Minterest NFTs unlocking massive APY Boosts
3. Minterest dashboard for a user-friendly experience
4. Exclusive access to the private liquidity mining
5. Exclusive access to MINTY and LP staking

You can calculate your return with our Minterest Token Yield Calculator.

Minterest token value potential

To understand the potential value of the token driven by the industry-first Buyback Mechanism, let’s look at Compound. The protocol had a TVL of $0.5B and grew to a $15B valuation; 30 times growth! But what happened to the value of their token? It only rose by 2 times: from $160 to $320. All because the token value didn’t correlate with Compound’s TVL by design.

The Minterest protocol is the first protocol to link the value of it’s token to TVL. The Buyback automatically uses all protocol surplus to acquire the MINTY tokens on the open market and distributes them to the protocol users, being the largest and most consistent buyer. Therefore, when the protocol moves from $100M in TVL during genesis to $10B in TVL, genesis investors who stake MINTY can expect tremendous yield.

More TVL > more protocol surplus > more tokens returned to the protocol > more yield.

Receive Minterest NFTs unlocking massive APY Boosts

The NFTs hold tremendous value, unlocking APY boosts up to 50% for as long as three years. Considering 70% of Compound’s TVL is held by 20 wallets, you might conclude that for one of those holders, a 50% APY boost on all TVL deployed will translate into a significant 7-figure value add over years.

Minterest dashboard for a user-friendly experience

LBP participants will have access to a user-friendly Minterest dashboard for a simple and transparent experience, hosting an overview and a leaderboard detailing live the USDC contributed by various participants in the LBP. They can also track their amounts and NFT level, along with the real-time changes in the price.

Access the dashboard here.

Exclusive access to the private liquidity mining

Minterest NFT holders get exclusive access to the private liquidity mining event. The protocol’s private launch is scheduled for the end of Q1 2022. For one month, the protocol will only be accessible to participants who hold an NFT from the LBP, their entry ticket to the pre-mine phase.

Exclusive access to MINTY and LP staking

The tokens acquired through the LBP are the only fully-vested tokens, all non-LBP tokens are locked for a minimum of 1 year in a block by block vesting schedule. This is a massive advantage since the LBP MINTY tokens are instantly tradeable during the DEX launch and eligible for the LP staking program.

The other option is to stake the MINTY LBP token in the Minterest protocol itself, earning all the Buyback rewards distributed to the limited number of stakers.

Both the liquidity mining and MINTY/ LP staking together are designed to drive massive APYs at the high end of 3-figures and more for the LBP participants.

LBP – Frequently asked questions

Why do we hold an LBP token event?

The Minterest LBP is a response to increasing requests for access to MINTY tokens. The mechanism protects our community from front running by large accounts and bots, built to incentivize a fair distribution of tokens across the 2-day event duration instead of being sold out in no time. To learn more about the “why” and “how-to” Minterest LBP, please read the article here.

What are the LBP Specs?

The LBP on Copper is set up with the following metrics:

Where: Minterest.com
LBP Pools: Copper
Start: 08th of February 2022 – 2 pm GMT
End: 10th of February 2022 – 2 pm GMT
MINTY Max Supply: 2,500,000 MINTY(2.5% total supply)
LBP Base Pair: USDC/MINTY
Initial MINTY liquidity provided: 2,500,000 MINTY
Initial USDC liquidity provided: 300,000 USDC
LBP Weights: Starting at 98/2 and will gradually adjust to 50/50

LBP Starting price: 5.88 USDCFor more information, please visit Copper.

When is the token private launch on DEXs and CEXs?

Token TGE and private launch on DEXs and CEXs will take place after the Minterest Protocol launches.

What are the vesting terms?

There will be no vesting for the tokens in the public offering. All tokens will be fully unlocked upon the launch of the Minterest Protocol (scheduled for March 2022). They will be fully liquid to trade on exchanges, to stake on Minterest, and to provide liquidity on DEXs.

To learn more, visit our extensive FAQ here: Introducing Minterest – Minterest Docs

What is Minterest?

Minterest is a decentralised lending protocol. It comes with a unique economic model where the protocol itself captures 100% of the value it creates from interest income, flash loan fees, and auto-liquidation fees which it distributes to its users in return for their active participation in governance.

*Note that Minterest’s Autoliquidation Engine has been renamed to Solvency Engine.

We are incredibly grateful for the support from everyone who participated and put their trust in the Minterest team. Head over to this blog post to learn more about our community allocation event.

In this short guide, we will explain the process of participating in the Community Allocation Event 2 and how you can become a part of the protocol’s growth journey.

Community allocation rewards

Just a recap from our previous guide; in the Community Allocation phase, people who signed up with the Minterest Sign-up Bot in Telegram will have a guaranteed allocation of between 100 USD and 500 USD.

The Community Allocation Event offers the following rewards:

1. Guaranteed allocation with the lowest average price in the subsequent LBP. Learn more about how this value is calculated here.
2. Activation of all NFT lottery tickets held, the CAE 2 participation being the gateways to win an NFT with APY boosts exceeding 7-figure value-add and access to exclusive pre-mining during the private launch of the Minterest protocol in Q1 2022.

How to participate in the Community Allocation Event
(CAE 2)

Step 1: Whitelisting
(Opens 10th January 2022)

Access the whitelisting via confirmation email

10.01.2022 – People who signed up with the Minterest Sign-up Bot in Telegram in December 2021 will receive an email from nextlevel@minterest.com. Please make sure to double check the email address once you receive it to avoid phishing attacks or scammers trying to get access to your funds. We will never request funds via email. This email will only ask you to complete the whitelisting steps in our whitelisting software.

Access the whitelisting via direct access

10.01.2022 – 24.01.2022 -The whitelisting can be accessed through our campaign page here: https://minterest.com/nextlevel

Whitelisting process

10.01.2022 – 24.01.2022 – The email will contain a link to the whitelisting interface. Please make sure the whitelisting email was sent from nextlevel@minterest.com. Then click the link and continue with the whitelisting. To participate in the event, participants must input their email, their sending/receiving MetaMask wallet address and follow us on Twitter.

Once you complete the whitelisting you will receive a confirmation email from noreply+minterest@gleam.io confirming it. This email will contain your unique referral code and a link to the whitelisting page to confirm your participation status.

Refer and earn

We are excited to see our community grow, and you help introducing the #NextLevelDeFi by referring your friends and getting rewards! You’ll get a chance to win 1 more NFT lottery ticket for each referral. Read about the 7-figure NFT lottery prize pool here.

Step 2: Depositing in the CAE 2
(Opens 24th January 2022)

Community Allocation Event access

24.01.2022 – 31.01.2020 – On the 24th of January 4pm GMT+2 you will receive an email that contains a link to the Community Allocation Event Deposit Interface. The event will be open for one week, and you can deposit up to 500 USDC.

You will be able to make a deposit via Metamask. We support both ETH and BSC networks. Read the following instructions on how to set up your Metamask wallet for a low gas fee transaction via the BSC network. Click here.

Your depositing address will also be your Moonbeam network receiving address (since Moonbeam shares the same wallet address structure as Ethereum and BSC) and will be automatically documented when you connect your Metamask wallet.

Final confirmation

24.01.2022 – 31.01.2020 – When your funds are deposited, you will receive a confirmation email, informing you that your funds have safely reached Minterest.

Confirmation of token price

To know exactly how many tokens you will receive through your CAE 2 deposit, you need to wait until the end of the LBP token event on the 11th of February 2022. This day you will receive an email informing you about the number of MINTY tokens you have secured in the CAE 2, priced at the lowest average price in the LBP, securing you the best price token price in the whole public event. Read more on how this price is calculated here.

Liquidity bootstrapping pool

More information will follow in a separate article on how to participate in the LBP.

Sign up for the whitelisting and join our Telegram and Discord channels to become a part of our growing community!

What is Minterest?

Minterest is a decentralised lending protocol. It comes with a unique economic model where the protocol itself captures 100% of the value it creates from interest income, flash loan fees, and auto-liquidation fees which it passes on to its users in return for their active participation in governance.

The entire premise of DeFi is to create a fairer, more inclusive financial ecosystem for all. However, Minterest is fully aware that the biggest proportion of the beneficiaries are professional investors. For example, according to Dune Analytics. 72% of all TVL in Compound is held by only a few wallets. In addition, users often miss out on allocations, and Minterest aims to change this.

Firstly we have created an environment whereby everyone who signs up for the whitelisting is guaranteed an allocation. Secondly we launched a ground-breaking NFT lottery with 7 figure APY boosts that the entire community can access, instead of a wealthy few!

Why NFTs?

The NFTs are designed to incentivise investors with large TVL and to foster long-term loyalty. The NFTs will give the top level investors the ability to earn up to 50% more APY for a three-year period on unlimited TVL. For the largest professional users, this NFT unlocks protocol functionality that can result in millions of dollars of additional rewards. Further, the NFTs work as “keys” to exclusive protocol functionality, e.g. early access to the protocol beta launch.

The NFTs could generate tremendous value for anyone who holds them, and the entire Minterest community will have the opportunity to access them.
Each NFT features custom artwork in the image of a blockchain superstar, crafted by noted illustrators. View all unveiled NFTs and marvel at the range of artistic expression at our NFT gallery here: NFT gallery.

How it works

The lottery has 85 NFTs – all providing different boosts over different time periods for unlimited TVL. The 85 NFTs will produce a protocol functionality value-add which will exceed 7-figures – Our Level 1 NFT, featuring Satoshi Nakamoto, provides a rewards boost of 50% over 36 months, plus early access to the Minterest protocol beta launch.

NFT lottery tickets can be collected throughout the Minterest Next Level Community Allocation Event (CAE), benefiting early supporters and rewarding referrals.

The NFT Levels & functionality

The Minterest APY boost NFTs have different functionalities based on their levels. As we mentioned in a previous article, the value-add of one NFT can exceed 7 figures. Please visit here for more information: NFT lottery. We are making sure that all our community benefits from the tremendous value of these NFTs, locking away 85 of those in the lottery pool!

The major lottery for Minterest NFTs will take place on the 14th of February. To be eligible you must make a deposit in CAE or LBP. Earn NFT “APY Boost” lottery tickets by referring a friend in the Whitelisting interface. Each person referred will result in an additional lottery ticket for you and them! Please ensure that you complete all mandatory steps in the Whitelisting.

According to the Whitepaper 1.2 updates, the validity boost has been changed.

What do I need to do to participate

1. You can simply follow this link and complete the whitelisting steps.
   
   
2. You can earn NFT ‘APY Boost’ lottery tickets by referring a friend in the whitelisting interface. If a referral completes at least one action, both of you will receive an additional lottery ticket.
   
   
3. To be eligible to participate in the NFT ‘APY Boost’ lottery, you must make a deposit in CAE 2.
   
   

Did you Whitelist in the December 2021 CAE and are curious about whether you need to Whitelist again?

If you participated in the earlier CAE in December 2021 and opted to keep your deposit with Minterest, you are not required to Whitelist again. However, Whitelisting again with the same email address can earn you more lottery tickets through referring friends. Note, all of your previously earned lottery tickets have been rolled-over into this CAE!

Received a refund or did not make a deposit at all, you are required to Whitelist again using the same email address. Any previously earned lottery tickets will roll-over into this CAE too!

Have a look at our event page for more information and Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter or join our Telegram and Discord channels to ask any questions and stay up to date with our current events.

About Minterest

Minterest is a unique borrowing/lending protocol built by industry leaders to service the billions in Total Value Locked (TVL), in DeFi lending projects, with the specific aim of putting user benefits at its core. It provides users with a decentralised financial platform that is fair and inclusive.

The Minterest protocol has the world’s first buyback mechanism, which automatically passes on rewards to contributing platform users. This way, users receive protocol rewards on top of industry leading borrowing/lending rates, creating the potential for the highest long-term yields in DeFi. The protocol also has an on-chain treasury which captures and shares liquidation rewards with users.