Arbitrum may be distributing tens of millions of dollars’ worth of its native token to encourage layer-2 development and user activity for the third time in the previous five months.
On Tuesday, the DAO approved a first Snapshot vote to use 45.8 million arbitrum (ARB), or about $90 million at current pricing, to finance a “long term incentives program.”
The initiative would choose three advisers to offer projects comments on their grant submissions, and a five-person council would pre-screen potential grant recipients. A second Tally vote is required before the plan is approved.
In October, Arbitrum sponsored a public competition to determine how to distribute funds from a $44 million “short term incentives program.” It extended the first round of incentives in November, allocating an extra $20 million ARB to “backfund” candidates whose plans were approved but were not funded because of a tiebreaker.
According to an OpenBlock dashboard, projects financed by Arbitrum’s rewards program grew in terms of total value locked (TVL), volume, fees, and daily active users (DAUs) after receiving financing. It’s perhaps too soon to make judgments on the efficacy of the funds, though, as the cryptocurrency market as a whole rose over that time.
The war chest of Arbitrum has also increased significantly. According to DeepDAO, its treasury worth has skyrocketed from $3 billion in October 2023 to $7 billion.
Apart from the bigger ARB pool, the main distinction between this grant round and the previous one is the establishment of a council and advisors who would screen grant applicants, avoiding governance fatigue on the part of Arbitrum delegates. On Snapshot, elections for the suggested council members and advisors have already begun.
Also Read: Arbitrum Unveils Plan for Creation of Custom Orbit Chains
