Cycle 42 Grants Report

We’re pleased to share the results of Cycle 42, marking the successful completion of the first cycle under Season 8.

Key Outcomes

  • Applications Approved: 3

  • Applications Conditional Pass: 1

  • Applications In Review: 25

  • Applications Declined: 10

Funding Overview

  • Total OP Requested from Growth Apps this Cycle: 15,748,547 OP

  • Total OP Granted (Approved + Conditional): 950,000 OP

  • Season 8 Grants Council Budget: 6,290,000 OP

  • Season 8 Remaining Budget: 5,140,000 OP

Cycle 43 Outlook

  • High-impact protocols (e.g. Lido, Aave, Velodrome) remain under review and may represent the majority of OP allocations in the next cycle.

  • Several smaller ecosystem apps (NFT marketplaces, AI projects, account abstraction tools) will likely resubmit or iterate after declines.

  • We anticipate continued balancing between large DeFi allocations and smaller ecosystem experiments.

Process & Improvements

  • The AI + GovNerds dual-screening process successfully filtered out 6 low-quality applications, reducing GC review load.

  • Decline reasoning was clearly communicated and teams were redirected to engage with Foundation analytics or to resubmit improved applications.

  • No process or milestone delays occurred during Cycle 42.

  • Ai prompt iterations and alignment with Season 8 success metrics (generic TVL and total fees, not interop-specific) continue based on the Last 2-cycle experience. Aiming to make the AI more granular as we move forward.

Applicants Table

Title OP requested Result
Super DCA 30,000 Passed
PancakeSwap 600,000 Passed
Truemarkets 70,000 Passed
Curve Lending 250,000 Conditional Pass (pending confirmation)
Extrafi 100,000 In Review
GigaStrat 200,000 In Review
Strands 90,000 In Review
Lido 500,000 In Review
MetaLend 99,998 In Review
َQuintes 10,000 In Review
YieldFi 100,000 In Review
Superset 30,000 In Review
Kivon 50,000 In Review
Hydrex 100,000 In Review
Oku (Optimism User Acquisition) 150,000 In Review
Alchemix 100,000 In Review
Symbiosis 75,000 In Review
Renzo Protocol 100,000 In Review
Xombol 10,000 In Review
AI Power Grid 74,999 In Review
The BALL Foundation / Game 5 Ball ($BALL) 200,000 In Review
Velora 200,000 In Review
Aave 9,000,000 In Review
Arcadia Finance 200,000 In Review
Jerota 10,000 In Review
Velodrome Finance 1,000,000 In Review
Tydro — Ink x Optimism Money Market 1,500,000 In Review
Spicenet 20,000 In Review
GonnaMakeIt NFT Marketplace 75,000 In Review
Modern Society Labs 90,000 Declined by GC
Kyo finance 350,000 Declined by GC
Super Accounts 50,000 Declined by GC
Mana Group 100,000 Declined by AI (confirmed by GovNerds)
CheapGm 20,000 Declined by AI (confirmed by GovNerds)
SWaptorX 100,000 Declined by AI (confirmed by GovNerds)
Cat Fighter 20,000 Declined by AI (confirmed by GovNerds)
DCA finance 30,000 Declined by AI (confirmed by GovNerds)
TrustTrail 18,000 Declined by AI (confirmed by GovNerds)
Kuri 25,550 Declined by AI (confirmed by GovNerds)
4 Likes

Love seeing the clear reasoning for declines and the effort to guide teams toward better resubmissions. This kind of feedback loop really strengthens the ecosystem long term

1 Like