veBAL Flywheel: Aura Launch Timeline and Boosted Launch Pool

In case you missed it, Aura is an autonomous, non-custodial platform built to boost the yield and governance power of Balancer users and beyond. Our launch is right around the corner.

Last week, you were apprised about our plans for an airdrop and LBP to align key DeFi community stakeholders.

Today, we want to highlight our launch timeline and more about how we plan to kickstart the ve Balancer (veBAL) flywheel with a boosted launch pool, which in turn will make vlAURA a crucial medium through which users can direct Balancer governance and incentives.

Launch Timeline

• June 9th, 18:00 UTC
• Aura contracts deployed and verified on Etherscan; AURA tokens distributed to various time locks, vesting contracts, and multi-sigs
• LBP begins on Aura frontend
• AURA locking into vlAURA enabled
• June 14th, 18:00 UTC
• LBP finishes: assets transferred to treasury multi-sig
• AURA/ETH Balancer pool is seeded with ETH from LBP; protocol applies for Balancer gauge
• June 16th, 10:30 UTC
• auraBAL deposits and boosted liquidity incentives begin
• Airdrop distribution starts, as detailed here
• June 23rd
• Gauge voting starts for vlAURA holders (those that locked before the 23rd can participate in the first round)
• Aura begins to take Balancer LP deposits, boosted by veBAL in system to give farmers higher yield
• July 14th
• All penalties will be automatically redistributed to Aura Vote Lockers

It’s a lot, and it’s honest work

The incentive to lock BAL into Aura via auraBAL will be high from day one.

2% of the total AURA supply will be distributed directly to auraBAL stakers (important note: including those that opt to lock their airdrop) over the first two weeks of the protocol.

Those that choose to claim to their wallet their share of these rewards will pay a 30% penalty, in order to ensure AURA is utilized in the protocol from early on by active wallets. Those that vote lock this AURA will receive the full amount.

This large initial distribution is aimed at kickstarting the veBAL flywheel, and AURA’s governance influence over the Balancer ecosystem by extension.

According to Balancer Labs’ veBAL Dune dashboard, only ~3 million, or 3% of the total supply of BAL has been converted into veBAL.

A high headline yield will incentivize the locking of BAL into auraBAL. By making Aura the biggest, or at least one of the biggest, veBAL holders, auraBAL and vlAURA holders will benefit from boosted yield and other governance incentives. Aura’s end goal is to better direct and optimize incentives and governance power for stakeholders and liquidity providers.

To incentivize long-term auraBAL liquidity, an auraBAL/[80/20 BAL/ETH BPT LP token] StableSwap pool will also be launched, with 10% of AURA being distributed over four years to those that stake this pool’s LP token.

LBP and liquidity pool details

We settled on an LBP to be the mechanism for us to launch for three main reasons:

1. An LBP is a good way to bootstrap liquidity for a new token in a formulaic manner
2. Generate a treasury for Aura for bug bounties and system security audits
3. It is a good way to onboard users who want to vote lock AURA early and begin participating in system governance

AURA’s LBP will run for 5 days, starting on June 9th at 18:00 UTC.

The pool will be composed of 2.2m AURA and 100 ETH, and have starting weights of 99/1 AURA/ETH and run to 25/75 AURA/ETH over 5 days, provided the price of ETH remains above $1400, otherwise the weight change will be softened after 72 hours have elapsed, and redirected to 40/60 AURA/ETH.

Given the 100m total supply of AURA and assuming an ETH price of $1,750, the initial pool composition creates an implied starting value for AURA of $7.88.

Note though that weight changes at the extreme ends (closer to 99/1) produce relatively large price changes.

The swap fee for the Balancer pool will be 2%.

At the end of the LBP, approximately 1.7% of the total AURA supply will have been distributed.

[Section last edited on 7th Jun 1530 to clarify specifics around LBP]

After bootstrapping concludes, up to 50% of the ETH contributed will be used to form a protocol-owned 80/20 AURA/ETH pool on Balancer, matched with 2-3% of the AURA supply (dependent on the final LBP composition).

Aura will also be applying for a Balancer gauge for this pool to increase its yield potential for users that wish to add liquidity.

That’s all for now. We know it’s a lot of information but ahead of the LBP, we’ll make sure to give you a recap in case you need it. Stay tuned.

Ahead of the AURA token and subsequent Aura protocol launch, feel free to join the conversation and take a role in our community via our Twitter and Discord.