Top 10 DAOs (Market Cap)

Hello Xillion.One community!

In this piece, we will be looking into the Top 10 DAO projects, with respect to their current Market Capitalization (USD).

Market cap measures what a company is worth on the open market, as well as the market's perception of its future prospects, because it reflects what investors are willing to pay for its stock. Using market capitalization to show the size of a company is important because company size is a basic determinant of various characteristics in which investors are interested, including risk. Companies with larger market capitalization often represent more established companies with generally longer history in business.

Our Methodology:

Crypto market capitalization is the total value of a cryptocurrency. Where stock market capitalization is calculated by multiplying share price times shares outstanding. Crypto market capitalization is calculated by multiplying the price of the cryptocurrency with the number of coins in circulation.

Top 10 DAOs (Current Market Capitalization):

1. Uniswap ($3.82B)

• The Uniswap Protocol is an open-source protocol for providing liquidity and trading ERC20 tokens on Ethereum. It eliminates trusted intermediaries and unnecessary forms of rent extraction, allowing for safe, accessible, and efficient exchange activity. The protocol is non-upgradable and designed to be censorship resistant.
• Uniswap v3 is a noncustodial automated market maker implemented for the Ethereum Virtual Machine. In comparison to earlier versions of the protocol, Uniswap v3 provides increased capital efficiency and fine-tuned control to liquidity providers, improves the accuracy and convenience of the price oracle, and has a more flexible fee structure.
• Swap, earn, vote, and more with hundreds of DeFi apps, integrations, and tools built on the Uniswap Protocol, which includes 300+ integrations (such as Trust Wallet, 1Inch, MetaMask, and Coinbase Wallet to name a few).
• Components:
  - Concentrated Liquidity: Liquidity providers (LPs) are given the ability to concentrate their liquidity by “bounding" it within an arbitrary price range.
  - Flexible Fees: The swap fee is no longer locked at 0.30%. Rather, the fee tier for each pool (of which there can be multiple per asset pair) is set on initialization.
  - Protocol Fee Governance: UNI governance has more flexibility in setting the fraction of swap fees collected by the protocol.
  - Liquidity Oracle: The contracts expose a time-weighted average liquidity oracle.

2. ApeCoin ($1.44B)

• The APE Foundation is the steward of ApeCoin. It is not an overseer, but the base layer on which ApeCoin holders in the ApeCoin DAO can build.
  - ApeCoin (APE) is a cryptocurrency adopted to be the native coin of Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), developed by Yuga Labs. Since the ApeCoin DAO came into being in April 2021, the BAYC has been among the top non fungible token (NFT) collections with a vibrant community.
• There are three main categories an AIP (Ape Improvement Proposal) can fall under: Core, Process, or Informational. Core proposals have two subcategories, Brand Decision and Ecosystem Fund Allocation. Proposals that are being resubmitted must be classified as such.
• ApeCoin DAO’s consensus mechanism aims to make placing votes fair, transparent, and low-cost, so that ApeCoin holders can participate in the decision-making of the DAO.
  - DAO members can delegate their vote to another DAO member that they consider to be a trusted subject matter expert.
  - Voting delegation is the mechanism by which DAO members with tokens under initial lock-up will be able to vote.
• Every year, there is a DAO-wide vote to determine which DAO members will serve on a special council on the APE Foundation (the DAO’s “Board”). The purpose of the Board is to administer DAO proposals and serve the vision of the community. This initial Board will only serve six months.
  - A Board member may be removed and replaced prior to the term’s end pursuant to a majority vote of token holders.

3. Maker DAO ($904M)

• The Maker Protocol, also known as the Multi-Collateral DAI (MCD) system, allows users to generate DAI by leveraging collateral assets approved by “Maker Governance.” Maker Governance is the community organized and operated process of managing the various aspects of the Maker Protocol.
  - DAI is a decentralized, unbiased, collateral-backed cryptocurrency soft-pegged to the US Dollar. Resistant to hyperinflation due to its low volatility, DAI offers economic freedom and opportunity to anyone, anywhere.
• The Maker Protocol, built on the Ethereum blockchain,2 enables users to create currency. Current elements of the Maker Protocol are the DAI stablecoin, Maker Collateral Vaults, Oracles, and Voting. MakerDAO governs the Maker Protocol by deciding on key parameters (e.g., stability fees, collateral types/rates, etc.) through the voting power of MKR holders.
  - The Maker Protocol, one of the largest decentralized applications (dapps) on the Ethereum blockchain, was one of the first decentralized finance (DeFi) applications to earn significant adoption.
• The Maker Foundation’s highest priority is the security of the Maker Protocol, and the strongest defense of the Protocol is Formal Verification. The DAI codebase was the first codebase of a decentralized application to be formally verified.
  - In addition to formal system verification, contracted security audits by the best security organizations in the blockchain industry, third-party (independent) audits, and bug bounties are part of the Foundation’s security roadmap.

4. Aave ($842M)

• Aave Grants DAO is a community-led grants program to fund ideas submitted by the Aave protocol’s community, with a focus on empowering a wider network of community developers.
• AGD’s mission is to build a thriving ecosystem of contributors for Aave. They provide grants to projects, ideas, and events that benefit Aave and its ecosystem. Their hope is to be at the forefront of ecosystem development at Aave. Ensuring a constant influx of talented builders is critical to Aave’s growth.
• Grants have been awarded to developers building to benefit the Aave ecosystem in a range of areas:

1. Protecting users: Cono Finance by Gelato Network, Aave Liquidation Notifier by Steven Li
2. Onboarding and attracting new users: Aave quests on Rabbithole, 2001 DeFi developing a mobile app for Aave, Blockchain Education Network enabling any student to participate in Aave governance
3. Increasing liquidity: Symphony Finance’s yield generating limit orders, and Sacred Finance’s privacy preserving DeFi protocol
4. Analyzing the protocol: A growth dashboard by Omni Analytics, community enabled analytics program by Flipside Crypto
5. Improving oversight and transparency: Safeguard by Tally

• Besides decentralizing Aave grants, they have also worked towards establishing a Developers DAO and Risk DAO, focused on protocol development and risk assessment of the protocol, respectively.
• The Aave treasury focuses on ecosystem growth and earns fees from transactions, staking, and liquidations.

5. Dash ($490M)

• Dash is an open source cryptocurrency. It is an altcoin that was forked from the Bitcoin protocol. It is also a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) run by a subset of its users, which are called "masternodes"
  - Dash was designed to allow transactions quickly and to have a swift governance structure in order to overcome shortfalls in Bitcoin. What makes Dash different from Bitcoin is that it splits its rewards into three categories: 45% goes to miners, 45% goes to masternodes (these are computers that additional services in the network and have a significant investment in Dash tokens), and 10% goes towards its decentralized governance budget.
• Dash is accepted globally by businesses of all shapes and sizes. (160K+ Merchants/Services, 265+ Exchanges/Brokers)
  Dash Platform is a technology stack for building decentralized applications on the Dash network.
  - Includes: Decentralized Cloud Storage, Reduced Data Silos, Client Libraries, and Instant Data Confirmation
• Mainnet rollout (Q4 2022/23) to include NFT support

6. Curve DAO ($380M)

• Curve is an exchange liquidity pool on Ethereum. Curve is designed for extremely efficient stablecoin trading and low risk, supplemental fee income for liquidity providers, without an opportunity cost.
• Curve DAO consists of multiple smart contracts connected by Aragon. Interaction with Aragon occurs through a modified implementation of the Aragon Voting App. Aragon’s standard one token, one vote method is replaced with a weighting system based on locking tokens. Curve DAO has a token (CRV) which is used for both governance and value accrual.
  - Source code for the Curve DAO can be found on Github.
• Participating in Curve DAO governance requires that an account have a balance of vote-escrowed CRV (veCRV). veCRV is a non-standard ERC20 implementation, used within the Aragon DAO to determine each account’s voting power.
• The Curve DAO is sufficiently complex that it cannot be easily bridged outside of Ethereum, however aspects of functionality (including CRV emissions) are capable on the various side chains where pools are active.

7. Compound ($358M)

• Compound is an algorithmic, autonomous interest rate protocol built for developers, to unlock a universe of open financial applications.
• Compound is managed by a decentralized community of COMP token-holders and their delegates, who propose and vote on upgrades to the protocol.
  - In addition to being a standard ERC-20 asset, COMP allows the owner to delegate voting rights to the address of their choice; the owner’s wallet, another user, an application, or a DeFi expert. Anybody can participate in Compound governance by receiving delegation, without needing to own COMP. The token also includes code to query an address’ historical voting weight, which is useful for building complex voting systems.
  - Anybody with 1% of COMP delegated to their address can propose a governance action; these are simple or complex sets of actions, such as adding support for a new asset, changing an asset’s collateral factor, changing a market’s interest rate model, or changing any other parameter or variable of the protocol that the current administrator can modify.
• All proposals are subject to a 3 day voting period, and any address with voting power can vote for or against the proposal. If a majority, and at least 400,000 votes are cast for the proposal, it is queued in the Timelock, and can be implemented after 2 days.
• Developers building on top of Compound are encouraged to actively participate in governance, which will be tested in the open. As a failsafe, our team will have the ability to suspend the governance system (though not the protocol’s 2-day timelock) during the sandbox.

8. Decred ($330M)

• Decred is a blockchain-based cryptocurrency with a strong focus on community input, open governance, and sustainable funding for development. It utilizes a hybrid Proof-of-Work (PoW) and Proof-of-Stake (PoS) mining system to ensure that a small group cannot dominate the flow of transactions or make changes to Decred without the input of the community. A unit of the currency is called a decred (DCR).
  - Stakeholders make and enforce the blockchain’s consensus rules, set a course for future development, and decide how the project’s treasury is used to fund it. Decred’s blockchain is similar to Bitcoin’s, but with major aspects of governance baked into the protocol
  - To align incentives, block rewards are split between Proof-of-Work (PoW) miners, stakeholders and the Decred Treasury, which funds the project.
  - PoW Miners= 60%, PoS Voters =30%, and Decred treasury=10%
• Decisions concerning the direction of the project, such as how to spend Treasury funds, or amending the Decred Constitution or other policies, are made via proposals on Politeia. Politeia voting is not recorded on chain, but it is still backed by cryptographic techniques which prevent sybil attacks and unfair censorship.
• Anyone may submit a proposal on Politeia (the only requirement is paying a minimal fee which is designed to prevent spam).
  - The voting period lasts one week, and anybody who holds tickets at the moment voting begins will be able to vote on the proposal. All data on Politeia (proposals, comments, upvotes/downvotes) is periodically anchored into the Decred blockchain, using dcrtime. This enables users to cryptographically prove if censorship has occurred.

9. 0x (ZRX) ($302M)

• 0x API is a professional grade liquidity aggregator enabling the future of DeFi applications
• Every token holder, big or small, can play a role in governance -- from weighing in on ZeroEx Improvement Proposals (ZEIPs), to sharing ideas on how to use DAO treasury funds, to actively contributing to the protocol’s advancement in a myriad of other ways.
  - Community consists of ZRX owners, market makers, delegates, and other interested parties whose incentives are aligned with the good functioning of the protocol, including an ever-growing network of ecosystem partners using 0x technology in their products and services.
• ZRX token holders can participate in 0x governance by joining the conversations in the 0x forum and participating in on- and off-chain votes in the ZRX portal.
• There are currently three types of votes:
  - Snapchat: Non-binding poll to measure sentiment on a particular topic or proposal
  - ZeroEx Improvement Proposal (ZEIP): Binding vote related to upgrading the core 0x Protocol
  - Treasury: Binding vote related to usage of the community treasury
• The purpose of the community treasury is not enforced, and ZRX holders are in control of what to do with the funds. The suggested usage, however, is the funding of projects that benefit the 0x ecosystem and provide positive effects to ZRX holders.

10. Synthetix ($285M)

• Synthetix is a new financial primitive enabling the creation of synthetic assets, offering unique derivatives and exposure to real-world assets on the blockchain.
• Offers the benefits of DeFi with a fully on-chain permissionless futures trading experience.
  - Synthetic assets, or Synths, are assets voted into existence by the community and can come in the form of fiat currencies, cryptocurrencies, stocks, commodities and anything else with a price.
• The Synthetix Protocol has several key governing bodies and artifacts which co-exist to enable the decentralized nature of the Protocol. The key decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) are the - Spartan Council, Protocol DAO, Synthetix DAO, Ambassadors DAO and the Grants DAO.
• The Synthetix decentralized governance process utilizes these key artifacts - Synthetix Improvement Proposals (SIPs) and the Synthetix Configuration Change Proposals (SCCPs) which effectively outline proposed present, past and future changes to the Synthetix Protocol.
• Components:
  - Spartan Council (SC): The Spartan Council (SC) is a governing DAO which currently comprises 8 members who are elected (see Elections) for the duration of an epoch by community staking participants.
  - Protocol DAO (pDAO): An organization which operates out of a Gnosis multi-signature wallet. The wallet is assigned as the owner of the Synthetix Protocol core contracts, which makes the pDAO responsible for upgrading and releasing new contracts on behalf of the Spartan Council.
  - Synthetix DAO (sDAO): The Synthetix DAO is the DAO responsible for managing the Synthetix Protocol treasury, their only role is ensuring that the Synthetix governing bodies remain incentivized to support the Synthetix Ecosystem’s upkeep and future development.
  - Ambassador DAO (aDAO): Ambassadors are nominated community members who are appointed as a signer on a Gnosis multisig, their role is to gather support from Synthetix community members who delegate their governance tokens (from other external protocols) to the multisig, effectively empowering the Ambassadors to participate in external protocols governance systems which have a positive impact on the Synthetix ecosystem (i.e interoperable protocol features, listing of synthetix synths on DEX’s).
  - Grants DAO (gDAO): The grantsDAO is the organization that is responsible for vetting, issuing and accepting proposals to be funded. The proposals consist of public goods that community members want to be built that directly benefit the Synthetix ecosystem.

Understanding what a company is worth is an important task and often difficult to quickly and accurately ascertain. Market capitalization is a quick and easy method for estimating a company’s value by extrapolating what the market thinks it is worth for publicly traded companies. In an acquisition, the market cap is used to determine whether a takeover candidate represents a good value or not to the acquirer. DAO governance is vital in ensuring that a given project best positions itself for the long term, where effective management of a community is positively linked to favorable market capitalization conditions.

To our community, we thank you for reading, and would like to remind everyone of the opportunity to successfully launch your DAO on Xillion.One, and earn up to $50,000 in investment from us!

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