Moonwell

Summary

This proposal aims to bolster Moonwell’s security posture through increased governance participation and optimize the Moonwell Safety Module mechanics through two key changes:

1. Implementing a requirement that users must vote at least once in the last 30 days to claim staking rewards
2. Reducing the unstaking cooldown period from 10 days to 7 days across supported networks

This proposal represents a foundational first step in increasing governance participation and improving Moonwell’s Safety Module, with potential for additional enhancements based on community feedback and effectiveness.

Motivation

Recent events in DeFi have highlighted the critical importance of active governance participation in preventing governance attacks and hostile takeovers. Specifically, this summer’s governance attack on the Compound DAO where a group known as the “Golden Boys” successfully passed a controversial proposal during a period of low voting participation serves as a stark reminder of the risks of governance inactivity.

Following extensive community discussion on the Moonwell Governance Forum, this proposal implements two of the discussed changes while laying groundwork for potential future enhancements. The community has suggested various additional improvements that could be considered after evaluating the impact of these initial changes, including but not limited to:

• Additional reward multipliers for consistent voters
• Further cooldown period optimizations
• Delegating stkWELL voting power to third party delegates to vote on a community member’s behalf
• Additional governance participation incentives

Specification

Technical Implementation

The proposal will execute the following changes:

1. On Optimism:

   • Call setCoolDownSeconds on stkWELL contract (0xfB26A4947A38cb53e2D083c6490060CCCE7438c5)
   • New value: 604800 (7 days in seconds)

2. On Base:

   • Call setCoolDownSeconds on stkWELL contract (0xe66e3a37c3274ac24fe8590f7d84a2427194dc17)
   • New value: 604800 (7 days in seconds)

3. Frontend Implementation:

   • Add checks for voting history before enabling reward claims
   • Implement UI feedback for users who need to vote before claiming

Note: The Safety Module on Moonbeam will require a contract upgrade to update the Cooldown Period and development is currently in progress. This contract upgrade, like all deployed code on Moonwell, will be thoroughly audited by Halborn Security and we aim to propose this change separately once the audit has been completed in the coming weeks.

Frequently Asked Questions

Based on community discussion, we’ve addressed key questions:

1. Can users still stake/unstake without voting?

   • Staking functions remain unrestricted
   • Unstaking is subject only to the standard cooldown period:
     • 7 days on Base and Optimism
     • 10 days on Moonbeam (until separate upgrade)
   • Voting status has no impact on staking or unstaking capabilities

2. What happens to unclaimed rewards if a user hasn’t voted?

   • Rewards continue to accrue regardless of voting status
   • Users can claim after voting on any active onchain proposal
   • No rewards are lost; they’re simply held until you participate in an onchain vote

3. How will users know when to vote?

   • Proposals are announced on @MoonwellGov X/Twitter
   • Proposal announcements are also posted in Discord and Telegram announcements channels
   • Boardroom provides regular governance updates on the Moonwell Governance Forum
   • Active proposals are surfaced on the Discovery and Governance pages in the Moonwell app.
   • WELL stakers attempting to claim rewards will be linked to active proposals when attempting to claim rewards from the staking page of the Moonwell app.

4. Will voting “abstain” allow me to claim Safety Module staking rewards

   • Yes, any tallied vote within the past 30 days, whether it be Aye, Nay, and Abstain, will allow for you to claim your Safety Module staking rewards.

Timeline

• Voting Period: 3 days
• Implementation:
  • Immediate upon successful execution of MIP-X05 for Optimism and Base networks
  • Moonbeam implementation to follow in 1-2 weeks after Safety Module contract uplift, successful audit, and passage of separate governance vote

Additional Notes

• Gas costs for voting on Base will be sponsored through Coinbase Smart Wallet
• Future proposals may build upon this foundation based on community feedback and observed effectiveness

Voting Options

• For (Aye): Vote in favor of implementing the reduced cooldown period and voting requirement for reward claims
• Against (Nay): Vote against implementing these changes, maintaining current cooldown period and reward claim mechanics
• Abstain: Participate in voting while remaining neutral on the proposal