Thank you all for the feedback and discussion.
It is just an incredibly poor look if Optimism doesn’t trust its own product.
To reiterate from the comment above: positive-sum DeFi, and Superchain DeFi in particular, is the best longterm solution here. The Foundation continues to support the growth of DeFi across the Superchain through business development, grants, and product support.
This procurement process should evolve towards Superchain-native DeFi protocols, but this proposal is the shortest route to get staking up and running on a short timeline given the Foundation’s commitments and constraints around security, tax, and legal.
In other words, we are in agreement about the importance of using DeFi staking solutions, but that will require us to set up new structures to manage the security, tax, and legal implications for the DAO and that will take time. So the question is not whether we should include DeFi solutions - we should! - but rather whether we want to move forward with staking the ETH using the current structures we have in place to start generating yield for the Collective immediately (as outlined in this proposal), or incur the opportunity cost of not generating yield while we set up the structures required to feasibly enable DeFi solutions (likely until the end of Season 8, which is when this proposal expires.)
Exploring a Treasury Council: Rather than relying solely on the Foundation to make these financial decisions, the creation of a Treasury Council with a lead chosen by the Foundation but governed by a broader group can be a better solution.
This is a great callout. This is an important part of the Collective’s evolution. Here’s the high-level plan, starting in Season 8:
- Establish a Joint House Budget Board to enable the Collective to develop economic decision making processes for Optimism. (Mentioned here and here.)
- Support the Budget Board in developing an advanced and data-driven framework for Treasury management.
- The Budget Board could run a public RFP process for staking providers (including or even limited to Superchain-native DeFi) as part of broader Treasury management strategy
Rather than wait for the above to take place, this proposal is suggesting the Collective stake ETH to generate yield as soon as possible while we continue to evolve the processes and frameworks that will let the governance community make independent, legitimate decisions around treasury management.
Another important clarification, as it appears there is some confusion about this proposal type: While it is undoubtedly valuable for Token House delegates to share their opinions on this proposal, this proposal will be voted on by Citizens, as sequencer revenue defaults to the Retro Fund, which is managed by the Citizens’ House. This is an important part of the capture resistant design of the Collective outlined here. You’ll note that in the future, “The Token House may vote on proposals to divert a portion of the surplus protocol revenue for other Optimism Collective” which would come online when the Sequencer ETH: Passive Management proposal type comes online.