Farmers Markets #1: Vote your veAERO and veVELO

BbyA...nMtW

7 May 2024

215

If you aren't familiar with the veTOKEN model then check out my explainer post about this on Bulb https://www.bulbapp.io/p/270273dd-697b-4332-85ac-db65e50bb46d/vetokens-defi-lore-innovation-yield-from-voting?s_id=bccb5ecb-0380-433a-9e2e-f1405a0305e2

If you want to know more about the analysis here see my post on Bulb
https://www.bulbapp.io/p/d82b629d-6790-4bfe-b185-c1156997baf4/farmers-markets-0-beets-aero-velo-equal-gauges?s_id=d3ffcb86-d4db-4c5f-acc5-0546d4c1744c

Voting veVELO - Epoch 101

See Dune Dashboard for Epoch details https://dune.com/0xkhmer/velodrome
Velodrome Vote: https://velodrome.finance/vote
Optimism Block Explorer https://optimistic.etherscan.io/
Birdseye token explorer https://birdeye.so/?chain=optimism
Velodrome Epoch Dune dashboard https://dune.com/0xkhmer/velodrome

I've voted for the vAMM-WETH/TLX LP

https://optimistic.etherscan.io/address/0x6ea20dbc05f58ed607c374e545bfb402d5796770#tokentxns

Assessing the rewards

$WETH don't need explaining. But $TLX does

$TLX

Website https://tlx.fi/
- Staking https://tlx.fi/lock
X https://twitter.com/tlx_fi
Mirror blog https://mirror.xyz/tlx.eth
- Why leveraged tokens over perps futures
Docs https://docs.tlx.fi/

It's early days but the chart looks okay so far.
https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/tlx

Not the highest returns currently available and the LP hasn't caught much in the way of fees yet. LPs are heavily incentivised. It appears this is a trading vault protocol.
They're listing the Velodrome LP as a 'staking option' on the website https://tlx.fi/rewards which indicates they're likely looking to provide incentives longer term.
TLX staking by itself is a high APR right now (likely also boosted by token incentives).

Historically these sort of products do okay. There's a lot in the market but when trading is high they can offer high yields. But there's a lot of competition.
It appears TLX are partnered with the right people though so probably one to keep an eye on.

Those high vAPRs...

Special mention to the vAMM-VELO/wOptiDoge LP
https://optimistic.etherscan.io/address/0x92FB369363498d8bFEFc4EB705d8c91a51d22C45

Why wrapped OptiDoge? Well.... Who knows?
I couldn't find OptiDoge by itself and the chart is a train wreck.

On the website (if you can call it that) https://www.dogeofoptimism.xyz/ it says you can unwrap it using the wrapper contract, but nothing more is offered as to how or where you might do that.

Classic case of inflated vAPRs hiding real traps in terms of dead tokens.

Voting veAERO - Epoch 36

Aerodrome Rewards: https://aerodrome.finance/dash
Aerodrome Voting https://aerodrome.finance/vote
Base Block Explorer https://basescan.org/
Birdseye Token Explorer https://birdeye.so/?chain=base
Aerodrome Epoch Dune dashboard https://dune.com/0xkhmer/aerodrome - ends 09-05-2024 00:00 UTC

Who I'm voting my veAERO for

This epoch I'm voting the following gauges
Pool addresses

0x21594b992F68495dD28d605834b58889d0a727c7
0x37E769D2dcF3e3E8dFC37c0Df83EEB56edfC0fD2

This is the way I'm voting them.
Now I could've made $67 USD in total rewards just voting for the highest return but that's only if it stayed at the votes it's currently at.
And I wanted a wider selection of the tokens on offer here as they offer some interesting aspects.

Assessing the rewards

$AERO and $WETH don't need explaining. But the rest do.

$VIRTUAL

Birdseye https://birdeye.so/token/0x0b3e328455c4059EEb9e3f84b5543F74E24e7E1b?chain=base
Website https://www.virtuals.io/
Documentation https://whitepaper.virtuals.io/technical-documentation
Staking https://app.virtuals.io/stake
X https://twitter.com/virtuals_io
- Bittensor announcement https://x.com/virtuals_io/status/1787098131815080358
- Project explainer https://x.com/virtuals_io/status/1766828293603602939

It's an AI agent/model play. They've just launched a subnet on Bittensor (a really popular AI blockchain infra project). You can stake the models themselves with $VIRTUAL. I don't really understand how that works yet but it is something I'm interested in playing around with.

Token market looks okay for now. I've seen better but I've seen a lot worse.

$toby

Basescan https://basescan.org/token/0xb8d98a102b0079b69ffbc760c8d857a31653e56e?a=0x7919a2dd8ee4b77ecb11ecf2222aa843fab86213
Birdseye https://birdeye.so/token/0xb8D98a102b0079B69FFbc760C8d857A31653e56e?chain=base
Website https://toadgod.xyz/
X https://twitter.com/toadgod1017
- Airdrop being assessed for holder for the next couple of weeks https://x.com/toadgod1017/status/1781611335505059968

This is a pure memecoin. The upcoming airdrop might be something, though I assume the amount you need to hold to qualify would mean I'd have to buy a lot more than I'm going to get out of the gauge vote.

Another one where I don't hate the chart.

$WAI

BaseScan https://basescan.org/token/0x23471e7250bcd7ee21df3f39ed6151931d1e076b
DexScreener https://dexscreener.com/base/0x37e769d2dcf3e3e8dfc37c0df83eeb56edfc0fd2
Docs https://docs.aiwaifu.gg/phase-1-waifu-love-waifu-earn/get-started
X https://twitter.com/aiwaifugg
Docs and Whitepaper https://docs.aiwaifu.gg/phase-1-waifu-love-waifu-earn/get-started
Staking https://hold.aiwaifu.gg/ - staking is on Blast but apparently you can bridge the token through the app

Only very recently bridged to Base from Blast (hence the chart)

$WAI is connected to $VIRTUAL in that it seems these chatbots (aka 'AI Waifus') are being run though that infrastructure. The docs are really interesting as they lay out a legit problem to solve: Loneliness.
This isn't a new idea. There's a number of AI companion projects out there and have been for decades. On one hand this is incredibly ambitious for a small team building on very new tech like blockchains.
But...
I came into this highly sceptical, but after digging deeper left a lot less so. The project and product seem very well focused and targeted to a specific audience. The logic to this is all laid out clearly in the docs and it makes a lot of sense. If you're going to pull off a long shot then you have to be hyper focused and be able to bring your users along with you.
$WAI has positioned themselves well to have a chance I think. It's still not likely to succeed but it's not complete fantasy either.